Finally read this ambiguous and wildly unique book and I’m kind of mad at myself for putting it off for so long.

Doeer really did something special with these characters and timelines it felt equal parts introspective and a fever dream.

A new fave.

Unfortunately, it has been a few years since I read this book and I did not record my book report. . I wanted to leave a 5 out of 5 star rating, but NetGalley needs at least one hundred characters in order to do so. I apologize. This was an enjoyable book and I look forward to more novels by this author.

DNF 15%

I feel like my reading level was not where I thought it was when I requested this because I could not follow a word of this time travel.
It was sad because so many of my old bookstore coworkers loved this, but wasn't my style - especially that writing style.

I wanted to love this book. However, it was published in September 2021, and I had it previous to that (thank you #netgalley) and only just now finished it.
I had the sense this was going to be like a David Mitchell book. The Bone Clocks, say. But where The Bone Clocks is filled with intrigue and fascinating scenarios, this was filled with beautiful descriptions of... Well, everything. But these beautiful descriptions just didn't add up to anything. Then again, it took me the better part of 2 years to read so there's every chance I missed something along the way.

Actual rating: 3.5/5

As usual, Doerr spins silk from words. I found myself rereading sentences just to savour them again. Tackling an even more ambitious interweaving of perspectives than in his last novel, this one shifts through time and space as well. The results are...mixed.

The novel is timely. Nature and humanity's impact upon it, pandemics, isolation, truth, family, class, legacy, and violence are all notes repeated throughout the different perspectives. They do weave together, but there are so many strands that it's not quite possible, even for a writer of Doerr's calibre, to achieve a smooth finish. There's a disjointedness to this book arising from his handling of multiple perspectives that doesn't serve the story as well as it did his last book. While he maintains his expert instincts for suspense, at least in terms of how to construct his chapters and especially where to end them, his pacing is off; long periods between characters' viewpoints at times loosens his carefully-crafted tension.

Omeir was my least favourite of the cast of characters. I had very little sense of him until almost the end, and most of what is gleaned about him is told by others. The author is clearly drawing parallels to Seymour, but he lacks Seymour's definition. Otherwise, I found Doerr's characters compelling and uniquely told, especially Anna and Konstance.

Amazing book! I’m still figuring out this platform so I did read and review this a while ago but Doerr’s writing is stunning as always and the cumulative end was so amazing!

It's been a while since I finished this book (Feb, 22). I only remember enjoying the book very much and finding it somewhat intriguing. I found it worthwhile and recommend it strongly.

this one took me several tries to get into before I was able to stay reading it long enough to finish. This surprised me, given the author, as I loved his other book. However, once I got into it, it was interesting and a good read. It’s a bit of a longer one, with a lot going on, but if you’ve got the time and the patience to sit back and slowly enjoy it, you will enjoy.

For all you fans of Anthony Doerr and All the Light We Cannot See, rest assured, because Cloud Cuckoo Land delivers more of the same: endless, beautiful descriptions of mundane nonevents and no actual plot to be seen anywhere. I'm sitting here trying to think up some sentences to describe what this book is about, and I'm honestly at a loss. It was beautiful, mesmerizing, and a must read

A wonderful read and thrilling story! I was compelled by the characters and recommended this book to my book club.

A slow start, for me (‘kids in peril’ openings are tough for me to power through) but once I connected to all the featured characters, I could not put it down. Prescient and introspective, with a gentle humanism at its core, this eon-spanning tale reaches from the classical world into the future was captivating and would be a good match for a mature high school reader. The author’s All the Light We Cannot See circulates well in the my library, and while this title lacks the element of romance that makes AtLWCS such a strong draw, having this title in the collection allows fans the chance to try another of Doerr’s works.

This book was tough to get into, and I struggled to understand what was happening in the first third. However, once the characters were clearly defined in my mind, I cared about all of them deeply and was excited to go from story to story. The last 60% was really gripping, and I read the whole thing in a few days. The language was beautiful and the concept was really unique. I loved seeing the stories slowly intertwine. I would definitely recommend this one! 4.5 stars

I was excited to receive a complimentary copy of Cloud Cuckoo Land by Anthony Doerr from NetGalley. Opinions in this review are completely my own.

I requested this book because I had heard so much about it. However, I could not get into it and only got 1/4 of the way through it. Sometimes I have trouble reading certain books at certain times due to my depression or anxiety and the way the story bounced around, I found it very hard to follow at the time I attempted to read it. At these times, I can only read fluff type books (beach reads) and this was not that type of read.

I actually did not want to give a star rating since I did not finish the entire book, but the site prompted me to in order to submit. I hope to go back at some point and enjoy this novel. I will adjust this review once this happens.

This book was magical. I love how this sweeping story flits between the lives of several characters, but builds connections between them so adeptly. It was such an adventure to read this book. I really enjoyed it!

I loved this book so much that I don't even know where to begin with this review.

I knew almost nothing about this book going in, except that it was written by Anthony Doerr and that was honestly enough for me.

Cloud Cuckoo Land is a difficult novel to explain succinctly as it tells six different stories that are connected only by the fact that the same ancient Greek manuscript appears in all of the narratives. Because the novel is following so many characters (some of whom have POV chapters in multiple timelines) it can get a little confusing but I listened to the audiobook and I found that the different narrators definitely helped keep things straight. I personally didn't have any issues following the story but I can understand why others may have found the book confusing.

I'm going to purposefully keep my description vague to try and avoid as many spoilers as possible. Of the six POV characters we get, both Anna's and Omeir's stories take place during the 10 years or so leading up to 1453 and the fall of Constantinople. Anna is living within the city, stifled by her circumstances but trying to make a better life for herself and her sister, while Omeir was conscripted as part of the Ottoman army attacking the city outside. Roughly 500 years later, the book focuses on Zeno and Seymour who live in small town Idaho - their POVs tell their own stories and explain how they both ended up in the library with a bomb. Konstance's story takes place in the near future, 3 or 4 generations after Zeno and Seymour lived, on a spaceship called the Argos, travelling to a distant planet in an attempt to ensure the survival of the human race after they're forced to leave Earth. Everything she knows about the planet she has learned through digital atlases and stories from her father who joined the mission when he was just a kid himself. Finally, we get the story in the manuscript itself - Aethon's wild tale that follows in the traditions of ancient Greek comedies and tells a story so crazy it couldn't possibly be true, despite the author's insistence that it is. The six stories are at once separate and intertwined and as the novel continues you discover more about how they are connected; the way these characters are connected by something as simple as a story is the driving force behind this novel.

In what I've come to learn is characteristic of Doerr's work, the writing in this book is incredibly well done. The prose itself is well crafted and almost lyrical at times and overall makes the story very easy to read/listen to. The whole story flows so well and any twists in the story did genuinely take me by surprise. Between school and other real world commitments it took me a long time to get around to reading this book but once I started it I did not want to put it down. I found myself looking for opportunities to listen to the audiobook because I so desperately wanted to know how things would end. That feeling is echoed by some of the characters in the novel and maybe that's part of why I liked it so much but I feel like every reader knows that feeling. Doerr does an excellent job of demonstrating that no matter how different people are, how different their lives may seem, they will be able to find commonalities between them and that fact should be celebrated.

Books about books can be tough to execute, sometimes the meaning gets lost in the metaphor but in my opinion this book succeeds in every way. It's written with such care and the end result is an amazing work. Cloud Cuckoo Land isn't going to work for everyone, but it absolutely enthralled me and I found it as close to a perfect read as I can imagine. This was my best read of the year so far and I expect it to make my top ten of the year as well.

A gigantic thank you goes out to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster Canada (Scribner) for providing me with a free copy of this novel in exchange for my honest review. I'm going to end up with at least three copies of this book (I bought two others) and zero regrets

An epic! It required a bit of perseverance early on. I enjoyed getting to know each character and their story and would be upset each time the perspective and time changed. When I would return later I would struggle to remember what had been happening. So much was very good and so much was tied together as the story progressed.

Thank you to NetGalley for an advanced reader copy. I’m sorry I didn’t get through it all before release. I probably wouldn’t have ended up reading it this year without your assistance though.

Cloud Cuckoo Land is a blend between historical fiction and science fiction, set in three different periods of time with a large cast of characters, as such it is an expansive book. The interconnectivity between the characters, symbols, and themes is well-thought-out and executed, making for an interesting plot progression. At its core, the novel is about the fragility of memory, the importance of storytelling, and the human desire to be understood and leave a mark on the world.

In a call back to the author's award-winning novel All The Light We Cannot See, the theme of new technology disrupting existing power structures is also explored in Cloud Cuckoo Land. In All The Light We Cannot See, readers learned about the impact the radio had in WWII. In Cloud Cuckoo Land, readers discover how the advent of gunpowder and mega cannons brought Constantinople to its knees. Again, Anthony Doerr deftly explores transition periods in history through the lens of fiction.

However, the novel needs to cover so much territory that at times the sentences felt like generalizations, which gave the book an air of YA. Furthermore, the dialogue in the 15th-century timeline was not accurate, with some modern sayings slipped in, that immediately broke the illusion of the book. As well, the characters all faced hardships, but the psychological impact of these experiences was not explored, which would have provided more depth to the book and possibly reduced the YA feel.

Even though the scope and length of the book were large, I found Cloud Cuckoo Land to be an easy and enjoyable read that raised interesting questions about an individual's impact on the larger society. I would recommend this book to anyone.

Thank you to Netgalley.

Anthony Doer is a superb storyteller and has such a way with words. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and loved how all the stories were connected. Definitely a book that will stay with me for a long time.

Thank you for the advanced copy

Took some time getting used to the different time settings during the novel. Having said this, the novel was such a great read and how books , stories can withstand time and live on

Such a beautiful read with so much insight

What a novel! If you enjoy a novel that is easy to follow and a quick read....this is not the novel for you. However, if you have the time to savor all of its 600+ pages, it's worth it. Cloud Cuckoo Land provides alternating perspectives from 15th century Constantinople, the Korean War in the 1950s, a small town in present-day Idaho and a spacecraft headed for a planet far away in the future. At the centre of the novel is a piece of literature that spans centuries, by author Antonius Diogenes (real author, invented work).

It wasn't until about a third of the way through that things started to click for me and how the stories were related began to make sense. I really enjoyed many of the stories about many of the characters and I loved guessing how it was all going to come together. This novel is an ode to all of the classical literature that has and hasn't survived over centuries, where is came from, how it may have been rediscovered and translated. I suspect that it was also written during the pandemic, resulting in a striking message about the human impact on the environment. In the end, beautifully told and woven together. I enjoyed it!