Not As Great As I Wanted or Expected

The Color Purple by Alice Walker

Fiction/Historical Fiction

This is one of my books that I was supposed to love.  It's a National Book Award winner and a Pulitzer Prize winner and practically everyone I know loved it and practically everyone who read it gave it 5 stars?  I just thought it was an okay read.  Is there something wrong with me?

I understand why it is an important read.  I understand that it gives voice to a population who had no voice for generations. I truly understand that Alice Walker is brilliant and walks on ethereal lyrics.  But, I just couldn't get into the book.  I've never seen the movie and don't plan to--I don't even understand how it could be a movie without a triple R rating.  I think part of my problem might be that I read "Push" by Sapphire first.  I felt that book was so much better for many of the same reasons that people liked this one.  I felt that "Push" more exemplifies the heartache and heartbreak of minority women in poverty.  "Push" absolutely broke my heart and gave me nightmares.  Not this book, though.

While there was certainly nothing wrong with the plot, I tend to dislike books that have tidy endings.  This book ending felt too tidy, too happy, to neatly wrapped up to properly respect the struggles of the characters.  Overall, it was a book that never let forget it was a book.  I never got the sense of forgetting myself and falling into the lives of the characters.  And, while this would never be the kind of book that someone could "enjoy" because it isn't a fun read, it never rose above just an average read for me
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There might be something off with my book meter lately. Perhaps I've read too many amazing books in a row and this one just didn't stack up.