As She Climbed Across the Table
by Jonathan Lethem
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other reviews (showing 1-20 of 866)
Read in May, 2008
recommends it for:
lovers of satire or psuedoscience
Jonathan Lethem's As She Climbed Across the Table is two books in one: a parable about love and obsession, and a sharp satire of academia. It is narrated by Phillip Engstrand, a sociology professor who talks entirely too much. Phillip tells us the story of Lack, a hole in the universe opened by an accident of physics, and of the various academics who find themselves drawn in by it (pun probably intended).
Phillip's lover, Alice, is one such academic. She is a particle physicist who ...more
Phillip's lover, Alice, is one such academic. She is a particle physicist who ...more
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Read in February, 2008
Philip's girlfriend, Alice, is a physicist working with Professor Soft who creates a parallel universe in a lab. But the new universe will not detach and become independent. Something is missing.It remains a vacuum. Alice becomes obsessed with finding out what might be amiss. She names the vacuum Lack, and begins feeding it. Philip misses Alice; he wants to be with her but sees her slipping further away into the basement of the physics department.Soon she admits that she has fallen in love with ...more
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Read in May, 2008
Way too "high concept" for my taste. The premise is inventive and intriguing, but overall I didn't care enough about the characters to feel invested in whatever happens to them. The story is that a physicist's experiment creates something new -- a new universe, a black hole, no one is really sure. They call it "Lack" and its only characteristics are that it accepts and rejects certain objects, with no discernable pattern. A female physicist gets obsessed with Lack to the ...more
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Read in April, 2008
This is an interesting, forceful narrative that I enjoyed far more than the other Lethem book I've read, Gun, With Occasional Music.
This is, essentially, a modern day love story and one man's struggle to overcome his lover's leaving him for nothing. Literally nothing. It's weird, but it makes sense in the way that academia always makes sense however absurd. The novel takes place on a college campus and the major players are all professors or friends of professors.
What really shi...more
This is, essentially, a modern day love story and one man's struggle to overcome his lover's leaving him for nothing. Literally nothing. It's weird, but it makes sense in the way that academia always makes sense however absurd. The novel takes place on a college campus and the major players are all professors or friends of professors.
What really shi...more
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Has a copy to sell/swap
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Read in January, 2005
Quite the entertaining, quick, refreshingly creative read, which I have come to expect from Lethem. The plot for this one may be a bit more "out there" than his others that I have read so far (motherless brooklyn, gun with occassional music), and it was wildly interesting, but a little difficult for me to get into at first. Essentially, it's a love story, and one man's struggle to regain composure after being dumped for an untouchable, emotionless, matterless "lack" created i...more
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Read in August, 2007
Clever love triangle between a physicist, her social anthropologist boyfriend, and a black whole created in the physics lab. Inventive and clever. I was hooked from the first page. This is the first book I've read by Jonathan Lethem. I heard him on KCRW's Bookworm in July discussing his most recent book You Don't Love Me Yet. He made a great first impression. He seems like such a thoughtful, articulate, generous writer. I'm planning to catch up on his other work.
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An earlier work of Lethem's and perhaps not as stylistically inventive as Motherless Brooklyn and Fortress of Solitude, but still an excellent book. It read quickly and was good for my plane ride and waiting for my computer to update.
Lethem offers a clever academic parody centered around Physics and metaphysics, both handled cleverly. Blurring genres seems to be one of Lethem's greatest strengths and this one blends the Academic Comedy and Science Fiction really well.
Also, one of the o...more
Lethem offers a clever academic parody centered around Physics and metaphysics, both handled cleverly. Blurring genres seems to be one of Lethem's greatest strengths and this one blends the Academic Comedy and Science Fiction really well.
Also, one of the o...more
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I adored Lethem's Amnesia Moon. As She... feels like it was written by an entirely different author. I recognize that it takes talent to pull that off, but it's also kind of a letdown, since it was the Lethem of Amnesia Moon that incited me to seek out everything he's ever written.
This book was certainly readable but ultimately not as satisfying a read for me. My advice would be to put it toward the end of your list if you don't have time to read as often as you'd li...more
This book was certainly readable but ultimately not as satisfying a read for me. My advice would be to put it toward the end of your list if you don't have time to read as often as you'd li...more
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You know by now that I love Lethem, right? Who else could write a love triangle with a physicist, a social scientist, and nothing? Though is includes a blind Rosenkrantz and Guildenstern, Schrodinger's cat, and many other amusing features (some of which are surely physics jokes that I don't get), this is pretty much a love story. It's relatively simple, sometimes a little labored, but generally pleasant and fun to read. turn on "Particle Man" and enjoy.
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One of my favorite books, and certainly my most fun favorite. The first Lethem that I ever read, grabbed a random from a library shelf. Totally unexpected and brilliantly conceived. I love how honestly the characters are drawn, and that their relationships and emotions are played out very honestly in the face of the fantastic elements surrounding them. I've read this repeatedly, usually in a single sitting.
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Read in June, 2007
This was a thoroughly good novel. As irritated as pseudoscience usually makes me, Lethem did a good job of not taking it seriously enough for me to want to strangle him. Plus some of it was kind of cool - the idea of using nerve-blind people as a unique kind of observer, for example. I wish the book had broken my heart more, but I suppose it's meant to be more funny than heartbreaking.
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Re-read 04/2008
Along with Kathe Koja's The Cypher, another great book about people obsession over a nature-defying hole. Where Koja's book is all raw and grim, grit on everything, this one is fun even when it's saddest. The symbolism is so front-and-center that you can almost feel Lethem's elbow in your ribs, "Hey man, nothing is worth than nothing, am I right?"
Along with Kathe Koja's The Cypher, another great book about people obsession over a nature-defying hole. Where Koja's book is all raw and grim, grit on everything, this one is fun even when it's saddest. The symbolism is so front-and-center that you can almost feel Lethem's elbow in your ribs, "Hey man, nothing is worth than nothing, am I right?"
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Read in March, 2008
This book is so far out of my typical genres that I don't even know how to rate it. I picked it in a rush from the limited book-on-cd section at my library. Too sci fi for my tastes but it did offer some funny commentary on academia- both hard and soft sciences- which I found very entertaining. The book struck me as a very masculine take on a love story.
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Read in October, 2007
recommends it for:
People who love the Lack
Not close to Lethem's best, but the characters were well-crafted and believable. I would have appreciated it if Lethem had further fleshed out the main characters' romantic relationship, because I found myself wondering why in the hell Philip would care so much for Alice, which pulled me out of the story every now and then. Still, an enjoyable read.
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Read in January, 1999
This is such a quick read & such a fun book to inhabit...I'm always picking it back up to procrastinate. It's on the lighter side, which always reads as a fault, but I don't think of it that way - the book just has a lighter tone. This and Gun, with Occasional Music are less ambitious than some of his other stuff; I kind of love them for that.
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Read in January, 2000
Maybe it's because I was raised by a physicist, but this book is so beautifully metaphorical in its use of a physics experiment to tell a story about love. The author tells the story on so many levels, yet it's completely entertaining, and you need to know nothing about science to get it. It's funny, a bit wacky, but sticks with you.
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Ok. I'm about 90 pages into this book, a little more than halfway. It's... weird. I can't decide if the concept is really interesting or horrendously, unforgivably retarded. I guess "absurd" is a nicer way of saying it.... but absurd is putting it lightly. Hearty wtf. I'll finish this tomorrow, maybe I'll change my mind.
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Read in March, 1999
This is debatably the author's best book before getting all wordy and winning aways and junk like that. Pretty witty without diminishing from the topic - which is all about relationships. And ways in which they don't work.
What to do with it when you are done with reading it: give it to a physics major. Honest.
What to do with it when you are done with reading it: give it to a physics major. Honest.
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Read in January, 2008
Travis told me to read this book, even though I'd given up on Lethem for a while after not enjoying his latest effort at all (didn't even finish it!). This one is a quick read, lovely language. It's got a bit of a rushed sense to it, breathless maybe, as it hurtles toward the nicely wrapped up ending.
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Read in January, 2002
this was my first jonathan lethem and i found the odd juxtaposition of faux sci-fi and relationship dynamics strangely appealing. there was a palpable loneliness in the characters, a desperation for acceptance expressed through the inexplicably selective black hole which was executed beautifully.
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