Okay, so let’s just assume from now on that if I watch a really good movie I will eventually read the book it’s based on. Room was such a good movie. It made me happy, it made me sad, it made me laugh, and it made me cry. I honestly didn’t know that it was based off of a book until I saw on Goodreads that one of my “friends” had read it and decided right then and there that it was next on my list.

I love when there are little differences between the book and movie versions of the same story. It kind of helps me to separate the two in my head and enjoy and appreciate both without comparing them to each other too much. In the book version of Room, the biggest differences to me were that Ma had a brother and that it was revealed she had given birth to another baby before Jack.

I think both of these aspects added interesting twists to the plot. The parts with Jack’s other family, like his grandparents and his uncle, really showed how difficult it was for the adults to understand what he had been through and how they had to adapt to understand what it was like for Jack to be outside of room. This actually kind of made me angry at times because it was so difficult for them to understand what the world was like for Jack, and I felt like they could have been nicer about it instead of getting angry at him for doing something wrong.

This story was so, so heartbreaking and hard to read at times. I absolutely loved Jack and loved to see the story from his point of view. He’s such a smart kid and it’s really interesting to see him experiencing the world for the first time. You really want to root for him and Ma. Which brings me to Ma trying to kill herself. That whole situation was horrible and I couldn’t help but feel like she was being selfish. I understand that everything would have been incredibly difficult for her and that she would probably be extremely depressed even after the escape. However, she knew how much Jack relied on her and he would have been so lost without her. I’m glad that she did make a recovery for Jack’s sake.

What’s really scary and eye-opening about this story is the realization that situations like this have happened in the past. Oftentimes when girls have been found after spending years in captivity it is revealed that they had children or had been pregnant. This book really makes you wonder what kind of life people in these situations have as they continue to grow in the outside world. There’s something seriously wrong with the world and it seriously breaks my heart that people go through situations like this. It makes me feel so blessed to have what I do in life, even if my life isn’t perfect.

The ending of the story really made me happy and I felt like it was a perfect way to have this chapter of Jack’s story end. It really felt like Jack would be able to let go of Room and live his life in the outside with his Ma.