false<![CDATA[Middlesex]]>http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1174094087m/361400.jpg218747"I was born twice: first, as a baby girl, on a remarkably smogless Detroit day in January of 1960; and then again, as a teenage boy, in an emergency room near Petoskey, Michigan, in August of 1974." And so begins <I>Middlesex</I>, the mesmerizing saga of a near-mythic Greek American family and the "roller-coaster ride of a single gene through time." The odd but utterly believable story of Cal Stephanides, and how this 41-year-old hermaphrodite was raised as Calliope, is at the tender heart of this long-awaited second novel from Jeffrey Eugenides, whose elegant and haunting 1993 debut, <I>The Virgin Suicides</I>, remains one of the finest first novels of recent memory.<p> Eugenides weaves together a kaleidoscopic narrative spanning 80 years of a stained family history, from a fateful incestuous union in a small town in early 1920s Asia Minor to Prohibition-era Detroit; from the early days of Ford Motors to the heated 1967 race riots; from the tony suburbs of Grosse Pointe and a confusing, aching adolescent love story to modern-day Berlin. Eugenides's command of the narrative is astonishing. He balances Cal/Callie's shifting voices convincingly, spinning this strange and often unsettling story with intelligence, insight, and generous amounts of humor:<p> <blockquote>Emotions, in my experience aren't covered by single words. I don't believe in "sadness," "joy," or "regret." … I'd like to have at my disposal complicated hybrid emotions, Germanic traincar constructions like, say, "the happiness that attends disaster." Or: "the disappointment of sleeping with one's fantasy." ... I'd like to have a word for "the sadness inspired by failing restaurants" as well as for "the excitement of getting a room with a minibar." I've never had the right words to describe my life, and now that I've entered my story, I need them more than ever.</blockquote><p> When you get to the end of this splendorous book, when you suddenly realize that after hundreds of pages you have only a few more left to turn over, you'll experience a quick pang of regret knowing that your time with Cal is coming to a close, and you may even resist finishing it--putting it aside for an hour or two, or maybe overnight--just so that this wondrous, magical novel might never end. <I>--Brad Thomas Parsons</I> 1352495book2002Middlesextotal:91771|5:33353|4:32298|3:16935|2:5747|1:3437|9177136169613283593455116falsefalseTue Jul 01 00:00:00 -0700 2003Sun Jul 29 19:22:31 -0700 2007Sun Jul 29 19:31:51 -0700 2007
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243falsetrueWed Sep 26 07:19:51 -0700 2007Mon Oct 06 08:45:37 -0700 2008
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045falsefalseSun Jul 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007Sat Jul 14 06:41:29 -0700 2007Sat Jul 14 14:12:55 -0700 2007 I'd seen this book on the shelves of a number of friends and in the arms of a number of travelers, so I decided to pick it up. The title, "Middlesex", suggested English countryside to me. On the cover was what looked like a steamship, and a quo...more...]]>
325falsefalseThu May 01 00:00:00 -0700 2008Sat May 17 20:54:41 -0700 2008Sat May 17 21:20:10 -0700 2008 The CCLaP 100: In which I read a hundred so-called "classics" for the first time...more...]]>
221falsefalseSat Sep 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007Tue Sep 04 13:19:48 -0700 2007Fri Sep 14 11:17:09 -0700 2007 *Spoiler Alert* It's probably not a spoiler, but what I ha...more...]]>
219falsefalseSun Jul 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007Sun Jun 10 15:37:04 -0700 2007Fri Jul 06 09:53:23 -0700 2007
I agree...more...]]>
323falsefalseSun Apr 13 00:00:00 -0700 2008Wed Feb 20 05:42:01 -0800 2008Sun Apr 13 11:28:56 -0700 2008
all the major players....
Incest, war, teenage girl-on-girl experimental sex, deadheads, undescended testes, and a 2 inch penis.
Yep, it took me all of one chapter to realize that Middlesex was referring to something besides a county in England.
B...more...]]>
517falsefalseTue May 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007Tue May 08 15:27:44 -0700 2007Mon May 28 08:38:32 -0700 2007
Middlesex.
I passed on this book for a long time. I kept picking it up in bookstores and putting it down. I've seen quotes from it everywhere, all of which were beautiful, and kept hearing wonderful things a...more...]]>
311falsefalseFri Feb 01 00:00:00 -0800 2008Sun Feb 03 10:22:07 -0800 2008Tue Feb 26 15:02:29 -0800 2008
Iliad'. On the other hand, I had serious problems with some of the writing. I haven't seen my quibbles mentioned anywhere else, so I guess I'm alone on...more...]]>
19falsefalseTue Sep 11 20:37:24 -0700 2007Tue Sep 11 20:52:23 -0700 2007
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47falsefalseTue Sep 23 00:00:00 -0700 2008Wed Sep 10 20:13:21 -0700 2008Wed Sep 24 09:37:11 -0700 2008
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57falsefalseWed Nov 21 19:26:43 -0800 2007Sun Nov 25 19:50:48 -0800 2007
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56falsefalseThu May 01 00:00:00 -0700 2008Mon Mar 24 20:04:02 -0700 2008Mon May 12 14:24:54 -0700 2008 I have not read the novel, so perhaps this is true. As an audiobook however, it was magnificent. The story was com...more...]]>
48falsefalseThu Jul 24 01:56:49 -0700 2008Thu Jul 31 12:23:29 -0700 200858falsefalseWed Mar 18 00:00:00 -0700 2009Sun Feb 08 22:13:50 -0800 2009Fri Mar 20 19:54:01 -0700 2009
"Why?" she kept crying softly, shaking her head..."Why did you run away, honey?"
"I had to."
"Don't you think it would have been easier just to stay the way you were?"
I lifted my face and looked into my mother's eyes. And I...more...]]>
44falsefalseSun Jul 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007Tue Jul 10 05:01:48 -0700 2007Tue Apr 29 15:02:23 -0700 2008
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25falsefalseMon Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2007Sat May 24 05:45:51 -0700 2008Sat May 24 05:46:31 -0700 2008 I read about one-third. I could not get past the incest that the author was trying to pass off as "ok." I think that John Irving handles the topic muc...more...]]>
15falsefalseWed Sep 26 19:24:20 -0700 2007Wed Sep 26 20:44:24 -0700 200723falsefalseThu Aug 30 20:30:46 -0700 2007Fri Aug 31 08:43:59 -0700 2007
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53falsefalseThu Aug 02 20:58:16 -0700 2007Sun Aug 26 21:52:37 -0700 2007
I’m not kidding when I say, “You should read th...more...]]>
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