Jonathan Livingston Seagull Book Review

Title: Jonathan Livingston Seagull
Author: Richard Bach
# of Pages: 112
Series #: Not part of a series
Reading Span: One sitting (September 15th)
Rating: ***


Jonathan Livingston Seagull was a sweet, inspirational story about a seagull who longs to fly. He's an outcast, everyone else wanting to find food and shelter.

This book is super short, the actual story only being 91 pages. And some of those pages are photographs. I finished this book in one sitting in less then an hour. That's how short it is. Since it is so short, it is extremely difficult to get to know the characters. There were so many of them, it was hard to even know who each of them were. Jonathan was a little more relatable, as he had the same real-life issues as I did, but it was still hard. Also, when we first meet, Jonathan, he's a young seagull, and by the time we get to the end he is a senior bird. Again, it was hard to follow since it went by so quickly.

This story is a great, unique approach to the topic of hope and inspiration because of the use of seagulls. It was a really interesting and new way to read about it and I'm really glad that the author chose to do it that way. It was a lot more engaging and I found myself wanting to read on, even though the characters were hard to connect to.

As I mentioned before, there are pictures in this book, and prior to starting the book, I thought that I was going to love them. To be honest, though, they didn't seem to have any significance in the story. The only ones that I think added anything were the ones on the "part" pages with the different number of seagulls. It was a huge representation of the plot and storyline. The rest of them were basically the same – seagulls flying, seagulls flying. I think it would have been better if the author included one or two of the "seagulls flying" as well as the "part" birds, and that's it.

Overall, I think that this is a good read that all readers should experience, especially since it doesn't take up much of your time (less than an hour for me). I only gave it 3 stars because of the characters and it being so short, but other then that it is a really encouraging story that you should all discover for yourself.

Photo Credits: http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/71728.Jonathan_Livingston_Seagull?ac=1