The most recent addition to the complete review is my review of Jeffrey Eugenides' The Marriage Plot, as I finally got my hands on a (library) copy.
This is the rare book that I would have under normal circumstances stopped reading and cast aside (at the midway point, at the latest) but didn't, because I already have his two other titles under review -- which remain relatively popular (i.e. much-accessed) -- and I figured readers would appreciate coverage of this as well. (Ah, yes, the sacrifices I make !) Though it's not like there aren't already enough reviews out there: when I posted the review yesterday I already provided links to 128 others; by the end of the day I had added another dozen for a round 140, by far the most I've ever accumulated for a review when first posting it (and I dread the day two or three years from now when I check the links and find how many I have to remove/change because the URLs have (probably needlessly) been changed or the sites gone out of business ...).
This was such a frustrating book that I was sorely tempted to give it the full critical treatment, complete with all the spoilers -- but I kept myself in check and offer only a (still critical) review which I don't think gives very much away -- though even that clocks in at over 2300 words. Not that I think much can be spoiled about this novel .....
But in hindsight I'm amazed that this attracted so much attention (and a reported initial print run of 400,000); there's really not nearly enough to it; there are so many better books deserving of attention and readers ..... (I'm also disappointed that my rare foray into contemporary American fiction has again proven to be a disappointment.)
I am also curious to see when the first paper taking the Jamesian interpretation (reading Madeleine as Henry, Mitchell as William, and Leonard as Alice) appears; I'm sure others have already mentioned it, but I didn't come across the idea in any of the reviews along the way (and I think it's more interesting than the somewhat simplistic much-mentioned Leonard = David Foster Wallace (though of course there's something to that too, even if Eugenides didn't hang (t)his character at the end)).
This is the rare book that I would have under normal circumstances stopped reading and cast aside (at the midway point, at the latest) but didn't, because I already have his two other titles under review -- which remain relatively popular (i.e. much-accessed) -- and I figured readers would appreciate coverage of this as well. (Ah, yes, the sacrifices I make !) Though it's not like there aren't already enough reviews out there: when I posted the review yesterday I already provided links to 128 others; by the end of the day I had added another dozen for a round 140, by far the most I've ever accumulated for a review when first posting it (and I dread the day two or three years from now when I check the links and find how many I have to remove/change because the URLs have (probably needlessly) been changed or the sites gone out of business ...).
This was such a frustrating book that I was sorely tempted to give it the full critical treatment, complete with all the spoilers -- but I kept myself in check and offer only a (still critical) review which I don't think gives very much away -- though even that clocks in at over 2300 words. Not that I think much can be spoiled about this novel .....
But in hindsight I'm amazed that this attracted so much attention (and a reported initial print run of 400,000); there's really not nearly enough to it; there are so many better books deserving of attention and readers ..... (I'm also disappointed that my rare foray into contemporary American fiction has again proven to be a disappointment.)
I am also curious to see when the first paper taking the Jamesian interpretation (reading Madeleine as Henry, Mitchell as William, and Leonard as Alice) appears; I'm sure others have already mentioned it, but I didn't come across the idea in any of the reviews along the way (and I think it's more interesting than the somewhat simplistic much-mentioned Leonard = David Foster Wallace (though of course there's something to that too, even if Eugenides didn't hang (t)his character at the end)).