The story is mostly told in the voice of a 5 year old boy, whose entire life so far has been lived in a small room. Very interesting and well written. The prescient kid became annoying and I finally realize that was part of the intent.

If you can stand 11 hours of baby talk, then this audiobook is not half bad. Unfortunately, Jack, the 5 year old narrator made this a painful listen. The action starts on disc 4, before that you get a very long description of what life is like in a garden shed with Mom. Every piece of furniture is referred to by its name (the carpet is called “carpet” and the wardrobe is called “wardrobe” etc). The literal meaning of every conversation Jack hears and questions gets old very quickly. Once past this, the story does get exciting, even suspenseful but then, irritatingly, fizzles out again. Not a bad story but far from exceptional.

This is the best book I've read in years. An excellent "novel of perspective"

Wow. Just wow. Totally Loved It. This is the first time in a long time that I have read a book which felt truly original in idea, context, setting, and character. A few of the things that stood out for me were the author’s use of voice, and personification in this novel. The story is told THROUGH five year old Jack, and it is a limited five-year-old Jack to boot. The only information to which we have access is what Jack (thinks he) knows, or what he repeats for us. The picture slowly unfolds and when the true horror of the situation becomes apparent, you hardly know how to deal with Jack’s delighted acceptance of his world. He has made personal friends with everything thing in his world. Room is his world. Table is there. Rug is there. Everything has a name and is his personal friend. The other mark of this wonderful author is that she doesn’t cheap out on us. A lesser author would have ended the story happily when everyone was “rescued”. Emma plunges on into the after-rescue rescue; the heavy reality of life after non-life and of learning to live again, which is much easier for a five-year old than for an adult.

I wasn't sure if I wanted to read the book due to the subject matter and others negative reviews about the main voice being written from a 5 yr old. I admit I probably would have had a difficult time reading the book, but I thoroughly enjoyed the audiobook which had several voices playing the different characters. I also discovered that the book was more about the challenges Ma and Jack encountered trying to reintegrate into the real world. It was a very interesting and compelling story.

What a powerful story - it will stay with me for a long time. The creativity and attention to detail - in imagining how a little boy would see the world and how it would be if your world was just one room - was extraordinary. I was impressed. The story is also told with humor that comes from a little boy's innocent view of the world. Some of the analysis of the kidnapping by other characters near the end of the book bored/annoyed me because they were just saying what was already insinuated or I had thought in earlier parts of the book, but I suppose it would have been boring/annoying for the victims to keep going over their ordeal, too.

Listening to this book was hard at first, as it didn't seem a 5 year old would possess such a vocabulary. However, I quickly figured out that locked in an 11 by 11 room with an adult, the child probably had more fingertip knowledge available than the average 14 year old out in the world. The book could create some very stimulating discussions among the social science fields. I loved it.