The Marriage Plot

The Marriage Plot
By Jeffrey Eugenides
(2/5 stars)

It was about eight months ago when I finished reading Richard Russo's "Bridge of Sighs" which was the first novel Russo published after winning the Pulitzer.  Overall I found it to be extremely dull.  Part of what I theorized was that Russo had tried way too hard to prove himself after winning the highest award of American literature.

I mention that because this is Eugenides's first novel after winning the Pulitzer for "Middlesex" and it suffers from the same problems, although it mercifully isn't as long.  Overall Eugenides's attempts to create something profound and deep winds up being a dull slog, not anywhere near as good as his two previous novels.

First off, I think his entire concept that the "marriage plot" doesn't exist anymore is flawed.  There are plenty of books that still deal with marriage.  (Even I've written one!)  Maybe there aren't as many waltzes and as much worrying about manners, but marriage still remains a key part of many literary novels.  More than a few of those are updates of Jane Austen or other Victorian stories too.  Really Jane Austen has been updated every which way by now from sequels to being told from different narrators to being set in modern day to adding zombies and sea monsters.  So there's nothing groundbreaking about this story.

This story takes place in the 1980s probably for the reason that it was easier for the author to write about twentysomethings during the period when he was twentysomething as opposed to trying to write about the 2010s.  Mentioning the recession of the early 80s is of course supposed to make us think of the parallels to now.

It all starts at Brown University in Rhode Island.  Spoiled little rich girl Madeline is pursuing a useless degree in English, focusing on Victorian literature.  You can afford to waste your life like that when Mommy and Daddy (which she still calls them despite being 22) are paying all the bills.  Madeline is finally graduating.  It takes Eugenides a good track of the audiobook to finally inform us that the doorbell is ringing and her parents are visiting to watch her graduate.

Weeks earlier she broke up with Leonard, a quirky poor boy from Oregon.  But on the way to graduating, she finds out Leonard is in the hospital after a nervous breakdown.  She finds out that he's suffering from manic depression.  Madeline is the type suffering from Florence Nightingale syndrome and soon becomes essentially Leonard's nurse.

At the same time, in a largely pointless subplot, Madeline's sometimes friend Mitchell is doing like so many kids his age and going backpacking through Europe with his friend Larry.  Along the way Mitchell obsesses about Madeline.  Why?  Because the plot calls for it.  I can't see much about her that's worth obsessing about.  He also becomes Born Again and says "the Jesus Prayer" about 700 times, which is really annoying in an audiobook because I wondered if the CD was skipping.  He finally goes to help Mother Teresa in India.

Eventually, thanks to unwisely cutting back on his meds, Leonard convinces Madeline to marry him.  Needless to say this doesn't work out so well.

To put it mildly, this book was drudgery.  None of the characters are very likable.  Madeline is a whiny bore.  Leonard is often a bully.  Mitchell is a creep who should be watching Madeline with high-powered binoculars.  There's no reason I'd ever want to read about any of these people.  Nor do I care who marries who or doesn't marry who.  They could all fall off a cliff for all I care.

The writing is mostly fine, though there was one laughable section where Mitchell stares at a French girl's butt and thinks that it's alive and looking at him.  That only made me think of Jim Carrey in "Ace Ventura" talking out his butt, which I do all the time.

What I hate most of all though is that it uses that structure where it starts in the present and then we have to go back through what's happened before that.  Often we have to hear what happens from Madeline's point of view and then Leonard's or Mitchell's.  There's often gratuitous exposition, most of it not mattering at all.  There's so much discussion of philosophy, literature, and religion classes that the reader should get course credit at Brown for reading it.

Really there are so many better books you could read.  For twentysomethings in the '80s read "Less Than Zero" or "The Mysteries of Pittsburgh."  For a novel about a woman torn between a man with a debilitating condition and another guy, read "The Dive From Clausen's Pier."  Or you could read Jane Austen.

That is all.

Machine Man

Machine Man
by Max Barry
(3/5 stars)

There are a lot of books that start off with a good idea, but then fade with the execution of that idea.  "Machine Man" is one of those.  It starts off with a good concept, but doesn't deliver.

Dr. Charles Neumann is an engineer who's always gotten along better with machines than people.  He works at Better Future, a research and development company that creates all sorts of products.  One day Charles is looking for his phone in the lab when he accidentally gets his leg torn of by a machine.

Charles is rushed to the hospital, where he meets Lola, who works with prostheses.  She shows him the variety of legs they have available and Charles laments how primitive they are.  So after returning to work, he decides to invent something better.  Which he does.  He creates mechanical legs that are stronger, faster, better.

But Charles doesn't want to stop there.  Nor does Better Future want him to.

I had to sympathize with Charles at the beginning.  When I get blisters from my stupid hammertoes I wonder why I can't get sweet robot feet that wouldn't blister or get tired.  Then I could walk all day if I wanted to!  At the same time I don't think I'd want to cut off my own legs to do that.  Nor would I want to turn myself into Robocop.

That's basically what happens to Charles as the book goes on.  Increasingly he becomes more machine than man as Ben Kenobi said about Darth Vader.  It's harder to sympathize with him then as the book goes on.  Really after the interesting concept at the start it keeps getting darker and darker.  That's not really where I wanted to see it go.  I was hoping for something a little more lighthearted, as it was in the beginning.  But I guess if you like your humor really black, then this isn't bad.

That is all.

The Astonishing Secret of Awesome Man

The Astonishing Secret of Awesome Man
by Michael Chabon
(2/5 stars)

Sadly the closest I have to a child is a niece and she's only 7-months old, which is probably about 17 months too young for this. I'd have to say the recommended age for this is preschool and below. Otherwise it's probably not that entertaining. The story is so bland, cliche, and predictable that only a small child would find it fresh or interesting. I figured out the "secret" by the product description alone. Really, this is the best a Pulitzer Prize-winning author could do? Very sad indeed.

Since I'm not an expert on children's books, I can't really say how good the art is or not. Like the story it's serviceable. Not really flashy or anything.

Overall this won't make you forget any of the great children's books of the past. Since everyone from Madonna to Terrell Owens to Hillary Clinton has a children's book out these days, I don't think the world really needed another one. But I guess if your kid likes superheroes and is bored of all the other books out there, then you could try this. Not that I'd recommend paying full price for it.

That is all.

I'm A Box

I'm A Box
by Natalia Carrero
(3/5 stars)

Obviously I'm not much of an expert on world literature because I had no idea Clarice Lispector was a real person. Which actually makes "I'm a Box" even creepier than I already thought it was. As a writer it's only natural to idolize another writer; I have a serious crush on novelist John Irving. But the extremes Nadila goes to in this book border on the pathological.

Nadila, like many twenty-somethings is confused and trying to "find herself." And like many would-be writers, she tries to write but finds she doesn't have anything to say. This is probably because she's not a very interesting person. By all accounts she spends most of her time hiding from the world, reading Lispector's books. Nor does she seem to realize that writing isn't the kind of thing you can force like a bowel movement; the harder you try to force it, the less you'll accomplish.

Of course it's not just enough for Nadila to simply read Lispector's books. She's not the kind of fan who just appreciates the author's works and maybe writes a letter or something. No, she's that kind of obsessed, crazy fan who wants to BECOME the author. She tries copying Lispector's handwriting, she imagines long conversations with the author, and even goes around in a T-shirt with a line of Lispector's scribbled on it. The next logical step would have been to find Lispector's grave and ransack it. Maybe she didn't have the money for that.

The novel includes a lot of sayings of Lispector's that seem like literary fortune cookies. Surprisingly there's not much from her actual books. There are also pictures of other things, including Nadila's T-shirt I mentioned. At times the narrative gets confusing because some of it is taking place in the 1990s but then things from the 2000s are mentioned so I'm not quite sure when something is taking place.

As I said, I found a lot of this to go from simple hero worship to creepy obsessiveness. It's fine to respect an author and her work, but trying to commune with her dead spirit, staging fake conversations, and trying to interject yourself into her books goes beyond the rational to the point where you need psychiatric help.

That is all.