author: Jonathan Franzen

name: Steev

average rating: 3.64

book published: 2001

rating: 5

read at: 2010/06/27

date added: 2010/06/27

shelves: fun, novels, spirit-self

review:
This is quite simply one of the best novels I've ever read. Much of this feeling certainly has to do with the place in my life that I'm in right now, which in a way is similar to where the grown 3 children depicted in the book are. Having grown up in the midwest, now they're hitting turning points in careers and relationships, emotional upheavals, parents aging and requiring more and more attention and assistance, and the rest of the world going further and further downhill.



Despite these serious themes, the book is really uproariously funny too, and it gleefully and expertly nails right on the head so many people-types, situations, mental struggles, and family dynamics. Rebellious hipster intellectuals. Middle-american, cruise-taking, senior-citizen bridge-playing bourgeoisie. Desperate househusbands. Christmas "back home". In fact the mother in the book is in many ways a dead ringer for mine. It's just a perfect little slice of reality satire, and I wish the book were 6000 pages long instead of 600, so I could still be reading it for another few months.