SWANN, Leonie (2008): Three Bags Full. Translated by Anthea Bell. Anchor Canada, USA.
This book I purchased based on it's cover. It was blue and yellow and had sheep on it. I was in a small mystery book shoppe store in the Glebe and when the description on the back said the sheep solve the mystery of who killed their shepherd I bought the book immediately. Then when i opend the book i found that on each right-hand page there is a little drawing of a sheep in the corner. When the pages are flipped, the form a prancing sheep across the pages!!! SO FUN!
The first hundred pages are a bit slow as the sheep do a lot of grazing. However, the author pokes fun at human nature enough that it kept me going until the sheep finally did something.
The book was really enjoyable because the author writes the story in such a way that my reading experience really paralleled their adventure. This really makes reader feel like a part of the flock. For example, the shepherd had read them stories a lot which is why they are so clever. So when they were trying to solve the mystery, one of the big questions was 'what kind of story is this? a love story? a mystery? a horror?' The real mystery of this novel wasn't who killed the Shepherd- that's just a trick. But by the end you find in fact it was a love story all along and not a murder mystery.
It's hard to explain without spoiling the ending, or with you not knowing the subtle philosophical ramblings of the sheep. But i will say that i fully recommend this novel for reading.
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