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Dec 17, 2009

Ben rated it:

Dear Richard Powers,

I'm sorry I gave up on your book about a third of the way into it. I don't normally do that. Even if I'm trapped in an airport newsstand without a book, and end up buying "The Hunt for Red October", or some Neil Gaiman jerk-off dorkfest, I'll usually see it through to the end out of what I can only guess to be some misplaced romantic loyalty to the printed word, or possibly a mild to medium case of obsessive-compulsive disorder. "The Gold More...

4 comments like (11 people liked it)

Feb 07, 2011

Greg rated it:

It's been about five years since I read this book. It was so good, so smart and so well constructed that I haven't read another Richard Powers book since. I feel like his books need to be saved for just the right time, I don't know when that time is, but I'd always like to have another of his books to read for the first time waiting for me, sort of like Raymond Chandler or the last DFW stories I haven't read yet.

2 comments like (8 people liked it)

Nov 04, 2011

Anna rated it:

More people who love fiction need to discover Richard Powers. His work isn't the most poetic or character-driven, but they offer so much else. Gold Bug and Three Farmers on their Way to a Dance are among my favorite books (but avoid Operation Wandering Soul).

A story of two temporally separated yet linked couples (why do I love that gimmick so?), this novel is essentially about variations on themes, codes: in music, painting, computers, and the discovery of DNA. Cerebral and curiou More...

0 comments like (3 people liked it)

Jun 05, 2008

Brayden rated it:

I didn't like this book. I'm surprised I didn't like it more because I loved the only other book I've read by Powers, The Echo Maker. Both deal with similar kinds of people. Powers is adept at getting inside the mind of the academic, which is probably because they, professors and other intellectual types, are the people Powers hangs out with. But this book lacked something that the Echo Maker didn't: mystery.

Yes, there is a literal mystery in the novel. Why did Stuart Ressler, on More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Feb 14, 2008

Manderson rated it:

I actually didn't finish this book. I got 1/3 of the way through it, when I suddenly realized that I didn't like any of the characters. This is a book about socially awkward and introverted people for whom mundane occurrences are wrought with brooding revelation and significance. It is well written, with prose that at times can be as disjointed and cryptic--yet feelingly flowing--as its subject matter. But this is a problem I have had with some other of the author's books (which I finished)--it' More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Dec 16, 2009

Nate marked it as to-read

If you don't get the title's allusive pun (to Robbins's Goldberg Variations), you won't get far into this long, densely textured, multi-referential, and brilliant novel. It demands that a reader make connections between such diversities as the genetic code and musical notation, Flemish art and biological nomenclature, the logic of computer systems and the Dewey decimal classification, cartography and chemistry. Making such connections--deciphering the encrypted messages of our world--is the grea More...

1 comment like (2 people liked it)

Dec 17, 2009

Jen rated it:

Oh, how I loved this book when I first read it. I remember savoring every page and wanting to start over again as soon as I finished. It's on my "desert island" (most favorite/influential) list because it meant so much to me at a time in my life when everything was changing. I was a young adult who for the first time had figured out (some) of what I wanted to do with myself, and I was stretching myself in every way I could. It was a time of great growth, an exciting time, and this book More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Aug 06, 2011

Matthew added it

RLS CMW DJP RFP J?O CEP JJN PRG ZTS MCJ JEH BLM CRR PLC JCM MEP JNH JDM RBS J?H BJP PJP SCB TLC KES REP RCP DTH I?H CRB JSB SDG

As a preface to Richard Powers' The Gold Bug Variations, this codon-like string of letters not only mirrors the genetic sequencing found throughout the narrative; it also troubles the unsuspecting reader who engages Powers's novel for the first time. Is there a hidden, encoded message? If so, can it be deciphered using the coding techniques found throughout Gold Bug? Or More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Oct 26, 2011

Tim rated it:

I had not heard of Richard Power before I picked up a copy of The Goldbug Variations, so I didn't have much of a preconceived idea of what to expect. First thing I did was open up the book randomly to a few pages and read some sentences to get the authors general style. First I noticed the density of the style. I'm ok with that. I tend to like dense and even write that way some times. But then I noticed that as far as I could tell the sentences didn't really mean anything. Well they would probab More...

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Sep 16, 2011

Glen rated it:

It took me a long time to finish this book, mostly due to never being able to give it all of my attention, instead having to catch a chapter here and there when I could amongst all the moving plans, preparations, and actual occurrence. While reading it, I could not help myself from remarking to several people how it was the best science fiction book I had read in 10 years.

The book is two stories: the first is that of Jan O'Deigh, a reference librarian at a branch in New York City who More...

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Oct 31, 2009

Virginia rated it:

Can't say I learned anything about dna or genetics and there is a lot of scientific lingo here. However. It is a real tour de force and I had to give it five stars. The structure of the Goldberg Variations is so wonderful as background. The last few chapters of the book really dissect the Bach piece and the writer demonstrates that he really does knoww his music. I have read a lot about the Goldberg Variations, spent a lot of time listening to Glenn Gould's two recordings of the work, read b More...

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Sep 05, 2007

Julie rated it:

Overworked and overdone. Each sentence reads as though you were reading across two pages that were stuck together. There's no flow, no sense of context or storytelling at all, only a sense that the writer is trying to show off his ability to use a thesaurus. I can't get into this book. I don't think I'll be finishing it.

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Jun 01, 2010

Eric rated it:

The idea behind this book, that a love story could be woven around dissertations on genetic mapping and music, turns out to be less appealing than you'd think. (That is, you might think it appealing if you had a more-than-average intellectual bent). But the result is neither fish nor fowl.

I can see why those who praise it like it. It's ambitious as hell, and sometimes the metaphors and wordplay are very apt and clever. But the book assumes that you either are a novice when it comes More...

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Aug 06, 2011

Alan added it

The Gold Bug Variations title is a mix of The Goldberg Variations and Poe's The Gold Bug. One is a lovely set of keyboard variations, the other is a mystery with the answer solved by cryptography. Combine the two concepts and then think about the beautiful variations of the double helix of DNA and the cryptographic solution to the problem of how do we get from a series of paired nucleotides to the beauty of life. Use that as a skeleton for two beautifully crafted love stories, one in the past More...

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Sep 13, 2009

Matt rated it:

I found that the book doesn't hold my attention as do other of Powers' novels because when I read his works I usually devour them in a few days. Comparatively, this is a much slower read and due to the esoteric side story of genetics I labor through some sections. His novels start off esoterically with an introduction of the subject matter and the characters involved; however, at one point in these novels a major shift occurs in which he introduces a highly humanistic quality to the novel and th More...

1 comment like

Sep 23, 2010

Meg rated it:

I've been conflicted about whether or not to read any Richard Powers for a long time. I was attracted to The Gold Bug Variations because I like novels about scientists and academic settings. It also has going for it that it's the only book I know of with a postdoc protagonist. (Happy Postdoc Appreciation Week, by the way.) But the reviews I've read of Powers' work have always turned me off. This skepticism was overpowered by my discovery of The Gold Bug Variations for $1 at a charity book s More...

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Jul 21, 2009

Liza rated it:

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here

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Jan 02, 2011

Steve rated it:

A mid-50's scientist was on the verge of real discovery in the realms of DNA research, and nothing happened. Decades later a librarian wants to know why. Where'd he go? What happened?

If you liked Gravity's Rainbow you might want to give this a look. It has what I'll go ahead and call a Pynchonian level of technical discussion. Power's voice is hard work, but after awhile I found it growing on me. Rich characterization, imagery, and arcane references galore. Many appear to be included t More...

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Mar 14, 2008

The_markus rated it:

this book really struck some cords with me, mostly due to the overlap between several technical/scientific subject areas that are used throughout the book as metaphors and also as mind-opening lessons in how the lived world has been changing as we have access to more information than ever.

these subject areas are (a) the growth of genetics after the discovery of DNA in the 1950s, (b) the early history of on-line information sharing in large financial institutions using mainframe comp More...

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Aug 13, 2011

Debbie (Readerbuzz) rated it:

The title is a warning to the casual reader: If you don't get the title, or if you don't want to get the title,
beware."

In The Gold Bug Variations, author Richard Powers perspicaciously composes a novel with themes of puzzles (Edgar Allen Poe's The Gold Bug), music structure (Bach's Goldberg Variations), romance (two love stories that intertwine across twenty-five years), computer technology, art history, and DNA genetic codes. I remember reading this book when it was first More...

2 comments like (2 people liked it)

Oct 01, 2008

Marck rated it:

Let this be a lesson to a father of two: Never take on novels that are described on the back cover as "one of the most ambitious novels of our time!" unless one can be fully committed to the experience. Powers' achievement here is mind-boggling, but I was not in the best circumstances to fully engross myself in the experience. One of the key climaxes came and went, and I'm STILL not sure what happened ... only because I was not cognizant enough to follow. Still, I slogged on, promising More...

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Sep 08, 2009

Jae rated it:

Despite that it took me nearly a month to read, I did enjoy this book a lot. It was a great combination of the studies science (genetics specifically), music, and human nature (obsession specifically). The way Powers relates the construction of Bach's Goldberg Variations to the construction of the genetic material making up each one of us is inspired. The relationships of the characters and the introspect of why each is the way they are is incredibly engaging. Power's brings together another gro More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

May 01, 2009

Corey rated it:

Just too long. It could have been significantly shorter and still got its point across. It is a richly researched and well-written novel but it was just a bit too heady for my tastes. Some of you that thrive in this arena might love it - and I might have liked it better if I had a month instead of one week to read it.

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Jul 06, 2010

Ruth rated it:

I liked a short story of his in the short story book I just reviewed, so I tried this novel, which also has music as a major theme (along with genetics and information science). But it was too long and I could never figure out quite what was motivating the characters & why I should care about what was going on.

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Apr 12, 2011

Eugene rated it:

Like flawed Pynchon, it is a less than the sum of its parts, a double helix of love stories set thirty years apart, with two protagonists searching for the answers to the genetic code. Wonderful asides and tidbits of knowledge with in an encyclopedic panoply, yet like the genome it so focuses on the bits in the beginning are much more important to the final cell than those at the end.

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Aug 05, 2011

Rogier added it

Love, music, and cracking the genetic code. That should be good for an entertaining novel, but Richard Powers failed miserably. The Gold Bug Variations is about as exciting as reading the entire human genome sequence in alphabetical order.

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Jul 05, 2009

J. rated it:

It’s about the underlying similarities between, and conflicts inherent in, music and the genetic code and programming and language and beauty and meaning and relationships and patterns; the twin quests of discovery that are science and love… and it just blows me away. I don’t know how he can write so beautifully about such dense subject matter, and relate it so well back to the basic things that make us all human, but he can.

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Nov 11, 2009

Sarah rated it:

it feels like so long ago that i started reading this book, i'm struggling to summarize my response to it. it is certainly the densest, most complex book i've read in a long while. i loved the intersection of genetics, art, music, and some brilliant writing. but sometimes it verged on ranting, complex to the point of crazy. so i ended up skimming some sections and not understanding long chunks...but those areas were mitigated by the ones that totally absorbed and engaged me.
don't sit d More...

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Nov 29, 2011

Rebekkila marked it as to-read

I registered a book at BookCrossing.com!
http://www.BookCrossing.com/journal/10305578

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Jul 27, 2011

Deb rated it:

Richard Powers is awe-inspiring. Beautiful prose, and the ability to integrate complex ideas and science into a story with vivid, compelling characters.

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