A Short Stay in Hell

"FIRE. My brain is still trying to come to terms with a novella. WHY DID IT HAVE TO BE SO SHORT? I can understand that it might not have been as effective if it had been shorter. I still wanted 400 pages of this. The idea is utterly captivating to me, the finite library (a word I now know how to pronounce due to sassy comments from my friends) is one of the most gripping concepts I've read in a long time. I think that Peck was able to go over the philosophical implications it would impress quite well for 100 pages. He dived into the questions I wanted and gave me even more. I don't know why this book was so vibrant and clear in my head, but I found my visualization of it was better than it normally is. My primary hypothesis for this is just how into I was, I had to finish it throughout a couple of days due to lack of time and that was damn unfortunate. I hope that the hell waiting for me is much more mundane, maybe a little shorter too."

"just so utterly devastating and I hate imagining this life lol."

"So good! Existential dread at its finest!"

"Started off naively believing this would be a hell I could not only stay sane through but almost enjoy & ended halfway to an existential crisis. This could’ve been longer than 100 pages, this concept is fascinating. [4.75]"

"Hell is a seemingly infinite library. You can’t die. You have to find the book of your life in order to be freed. "

"What is the number just short of infinite? What does hellish eternity look like? This novella will stretch and baffle and distress your mind until you find yourself staring at the ceiling afterward as you try to comprehend what you have just read. <br/><br/>As an earlier review states, “Dante’s Inferno is a kids amusement park compared to this.”<br/><br/>Why? Are there bloody horrors and burning and pain and all the other things you might expect of eternal torture? Oh, no, no, that’s not the problem here. Such things almost seem a mercy compared to the absolute monotony of a hell this book presents. <br/><br/>Our main character finds himself sorted into a particular hell where everyone there must find the book detailing their life exactly to escape. You will eventually find such a book. You will escape, in theory. But in this library lies every book that could ever be written. Almost every book is gibberish. It takes hundreds of years to find a book with a coherent phrase. <br/><br/>Sure, it doesn’t seem all that bad at first. There are kiosks where you can order whatever food you want. If you die or get hurt, you’ll just regenerate the next day. There are some people out and about (although everyone happens to be white, American, English-speaking, and dead within similar times to each other), and you can even fall in love. <br/><br/>But what happens when you spend thousands of years with someone and become separated? It’s not like death on earth, where you know they are gone from the world. No, you know they are somewhere in the library where you will never, ever find them again. <br/><br/>Because did I mention the exact dimensions of the library? Just how many floors and books such a hell could have? It’s calculated for us. <br/><br/><spoiler>7.16^1,297,369 light years wide and deep.</spoiler><br/><br/>Let me try put this in an ounce of perspective. There are only 46 light years in the observable universe. Let’s say, like our main character, you want to see how long it takes to reach the bottom by falling 120 mph. That’s 2,958 years to reach the distance of ONE light year. <br/><br/>I actually want to cry thinking about that. I can’t do any further math for you. Please just try to imagine for yourselves. (Or don’t, for your own sanity.)<br/><br/>You’ve never imagined a hell like this, and upon finishing, you’ll pray that such an atrocity couldn’t exist anywhere. Billions and billions of years of your own monotonous existence with only a speck of hope on the horizon. Although, the main character is better than I am, because if it were me, I couldn’t even count on such a speck. <br/><br/>Is this an incredible book on existentialism? Absolutely. Will it stick with me for a long, long time? Even more so. Can I recommend you read it? I have absolutely no idea. It’s a horrifying concept that is numbing my mind. Do you want to think about numbers so high and incomprehensible? If you’re up for the challenge, be my guest.<br/><br/>Also, what a cruel title. It's genius, honestly, since even a trillion years is a drop in the ocean of eternity, but after reading this book, it's an ironic and horrid title."

"constructively unsettling"

"A story that takes place in hell has its setting listed by Goodreads as The United States of America. LOL<br/><br/>But is it really that ironic?<br/><br/>Like Peck's protagonist, we're doing the best we can in circumstances we didn't choose, either clinging to hope and moving forward or succumbing to hopelessness. <br/><br/>This quick read was a fun one that I could see easily returning to in the future."