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Your Fathers, Where Are They? And the Prophets, Do They Live Forever?

Dave Eggers

3.62 · Rating details · 7,927 ratings · 1,026 reviews

From Dave Eggers, best-selling author of The Circle, a tightly controlled, emotionally searching novel. Your Fathers, Where Are They? And the Prophets, Do They Live Forever? is the formally daring, brilliantly executed story of one man struggling to make sense of his country, seeking answers the only way he knows how.

In a barracks on an abandoned military base, miles from ...more

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Hardcover, 212 pages

Published June 17th 2014 by Knopf (first published June 1st 2014)

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Jun 27, 2014 David rated it liked it · review of another edition

Recommends it for: Kidnappers, people who like dialogue

Shelves: theres-a-dog-in-this

I liked it? God, I suck at trying to explain why I like a particular book. There's this lady who comes into my work and she always asks me what I'm reading. She's really only asking me this so she can tell me what she has been reading, but I always feel obligated to tell her about the books I've been reading. She is incredible at explaining the good and bad points of books and most of the time I end up borrowing whatever she suggests. But me, I am shit and she knows it. It's all in the eyes peop ...more

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May 01, 2014 Campbell Andrews rated it did not like it

This isn't fiction, it's op-ed wankery. After The Circle and this, I now have no interest in Eggers' next book. It makes me wonder: when's the last time anybody said to him, "Hey Dave? This isn't very good." ...more

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Jun 13, 2014 Lee Klein rated it really liked it

People seem to hear that this one has a long and unrememberable title, involves an astronaut, and that it's "all dialogue" -- and think it's gonna be "weird." I was one of those people: at first I heard that the new Eggers novel, the third in as many years, took place at a Japanese internment/concentration camp. And then I heard something about astronauts and all dialogue, that it's (mistakenly) more of a return to his early Velocity days. Eggers has described the book as sort of a weird stepson People seem to hear that this one has a long and unrememberable title, involves an astronaut, and that it's "all dialogue" -- and think it's gonna be "weird." I was one of those people: at first I heard that the new Eggers novel, the third in as many years, took place at a Japanese internment/concentration camp. And then I heard something about astronauts and all dialogue, that it's (mistakenly) more of a return to his early Velocity days. Eggers has described the book as sort of a weird stepson he worked on before The Circle, which I also gulped down and enjoyed. A horrific Michiko review in The New York Times: "a labored, predictable and tiresome piece of fiction lacking the emotional wisdom and dazzling prose that have distinguished so much of this author’s earlier work." Not much chatter about it. Dismissive reviews on here. So, as a fan of his recent fiction, or at least an interested reader along for the ride, I got this $25.95 hardcover from the library and read it in a day -- started it walking to work on Friday and finished it around 3AM unable to sleep that night. Rumors of all dialogue are true -- I feel like it's a successful constraint (pun intended) and makes sense for the novel's concerns. It literalizes unrealized desires so many sane folks have probably had to tie up a politician or a cop or an old teacher or a family member, or even a successful classmate from back in the day, and interrogate them, ask serious questions about life -- that is, about why it is how it is. Considering that on-screen characters other than Thomas the Kidnapper and those he conjures are tied up, again, I think the unattributed dialogue works well. It also aerates and accelerates the story, which is important in a novel that's idea-driven. What ideas? The main one is that young men, the sort who may have been mobilized to dig canals or perform heroically in battle, have an unfulfilled desire to be part of something inspiring, something epic and exciting and physical that gives life meaning, but since they aren't presented the opportunity to be a part of something these days, they pull things apart. They shoot up schools. They lose their shit and then, armed with a pathetic weapon, confront a SWAT team in their backyard -- essentially the climax of the story, semi-unbelievably discussed with a kidnapped cop, that very much resonated during the week of the Ferguson crisis. The book does a great job of withholding and disclosing information about Thomas's past, what led him to bring these people to an abandoned military base near Monterrey, CA. Definite narrative drive propelled me through the dialogue that only rarely slipped me up so I wasn't sure who the speaker was. In general, it's not just about "white guy troubles," as some on here claim. It's about a legitimate concern some troubled folks, mostly young men, may have that there's no clear and easy path to fulfilling their desire for the heroic. Of course a lot of less privileged young men and women might also have an even more legitimate concern that they have no opportunities for basic stability other than subsistence level service work in cities and strip malls. But this is more about a grand narrative into which to channel energies thanks to unharnessed testosterone surge, idealism, romanticism, magical thinking. I've been there, to a degree myself -- despite so many opportunities, I've felt like there should be something more, even something like what Melville described in the opening of Moby-Dick, Ishmael setting out for the seas whenever his "hypos" gets to him, his "substitute for pistol and ball." I've always thought the author sort of wants to be a congressman, run for office of some sort one day -- this may be his most indirect campaign piece, maybe more so than the other recent novels, all of which are highly accessible, politically minded fiction. Things can seem pedantic at times, sure, preaching to the choir (the phrase appears in the book), like that guy living off the grid in "The Circle," but Eggers definitely presents the situation's moral complexity. It's not simple black-and-white ranting at all. Features a wonderful congressman, too, a father figure who more or less jumps off the page despite his missing limbs -- LOL'd a few times during the second chapter. Anyway, glad I read it -- it extends Eggers's larger project and it's by far his easiest read. Per Michiko's review, emotional complexity might not be the concern as much as moral complexity. A recommended one-day read -- give it the benefit of the doubt until after the second chapter. ...more

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May 10, 2014 Timothy rated it did not like it

For a superior novel about man-eating crabs, please read:

https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1531168.Crabs_on_the_Rampage ...more

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Jun 10, 2014 Carmen Petaccio rated it it was amazing

"What do you want to build? The world is already built."

"So I just walk around in an already built world? That's a joke."

"That's the joke you live in." ...more

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Jun 30, 2014 Renata rated it liked it

Shelves: grownup

Okay. I love Dave Eggers. I can't help it. A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius is probably still my all-time favorite book, and I love What is the What and Zeitoun, and I love the work he does with McSweeney's and 826 and Voices of Witness. Love it.

But the problem is I think over the last few years (as he enters middle-aged white dude status) Dave Eggers has been on some kind of quest to see if he can make the struggles of middle-class white dudes as interesting as like, refugees and tragi ...more

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Mar 28, 2016 Sam Quixote rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

On an abandoned military base on the Pacific coast, a troubled man called Thomas has kidnapped an astronaut and tied him up. What does Thomas want and why is he doing this? To have a chat about the good ol’ days. Except for Thomas, the conversation is just beginning - and he wants to get more people involved...

This is easily the best novel I’ve read all year. Dave Eggers’ Your Fathers, Where Are They? And the Prophets, Do They Live Forever? is an all-dialogue novel, meaning no omniscient narrato On an abandoned military base on the Pacific coast, a troubled man called Thomas has kidnapped an astronaut and tied him up. What does Thomas want and why is he doing this? To have a chat about the good ol’ days. Except for Thomas, the conversation is just beginning - and he wants to get more people involved...

This is easily the best novel I’ve read all year. Dave Eggers’ Your Fathers, Where Are They? And the Prophets, Do They Live Forever? is an all-dialogue novel, meaning no omniscient narrator describing or setting things up, and everything the reader knows comes from the exchanges Thomas has with his prisoners. Maybe it’s partially the format, but I flew through this book in a day and I almost never do that with novels, even ones as short as this (just over 200 pages) - I inhaled this thing!

A large part of why this novel was so excellent has to do with how well Eggers writes the individual voices. There are numerous characters in this and each one has their own distinct way of speaking - at no point are you ever confused about who’s talking (even though the chapters are labelled after the location each one is being held so you know who Thomas is having a conversation with). You also know exactly what the characters are like from the way they speak and interact with Thomas. It’s pitch-perfect execution Elmore Leonard would be proud of.

Also, learning who Thomas is and why he’s doing what he’s doing unfolds beautifully. At first it seems like he’s just some nutjob who’s become obsessed with an astronaut but slowly you learn more about Thomas and his sad life. From there, new characters/hostages are introduced and you realise it’s a journey through the past via present dialogue, like a fucked up therapy session, to find out what’s really at the heart of Thomas’ problems. And, man, is it full of surprises.

I’m not going to go into those surprises but each chapter unveils a new direction the story heads in where a detail that felt like an off-the-cuff mention turns out to be a key part of a larger story that becomes clearer the closer you get to the finale. The book has a driving, tense story even if you know what’s going to happen at the end - there’s only one way things are going to end for poor, crazy Thomas - but the journey is just so enthralling and you don’t know whether he’s going to kill the hostages or not.

Eggers is a writer whose work is socially aware and this book is also a commentary on a number of contemporary issues (perhaps that’s why the book’s format is dialogue only, to help focus the reader on its topics?). Like the extreme way police forces deal with threats and violent American culture in general, the problems of boom and bust capitalism, the lack of help available for the mentally ill, and the seeming lack of a direction for the modern generation, no great cause to dedicate themselves to (coughclimatechangecough).

In one way Thomas is representative of all the directionless, frustrated young people out there who don’t know what to do and desperately want someone to point them into a productive direction. In another way he’s a cautionary tale for those who choose to let the past dictate their future, who can’t help but keep looking backwards and want to paint themselves as helpless victims instead of making the effort to try something, anything, to make their lives have meaning and move them forwards. One character nails it: “Thomas, we all get what we work for. Maybe there’s some variation, but still.” - Thomas didn’t work for anything, instead allowing his disillusionment to consume him, and this is where he ended up.

If you’re wondering what that title has to do with anything, it’s implied that they’re words that the character the book is really about - but who we never hear from directly for reasons that’ll be clear once you read it - says at a key scene that sets off this chain of events that leads Thomas to where he is now. The book is so artfully constructed, I’m in awe of Eggers’ abilities, really. He chose an ambitious approach for this story and effortlessly pulled it off.

I will point out one minor critique in the cop character who happens to have a very pertinent role in the larger story and yet Thomas just randomly stumbled across him. It was a little too convenient that this cop was so very relevant to the narrative. Maybe you could make the case that this is taking place in a very small town with only so many cops, etc. but even if it’s a stretch, I’m willing to overlook it as I enjoyed the story so damn much.

Your Fathers… is a complex, superbly-written masterpiece that shows Eggers’ heights as a skilful, gifted and enormously imaginative storyteller; it has depth and layers that are so impressive. Yet I don’t want to put people off from reading it by thinking this is an intimidating, exhaustive, unapproachable literary read - it’s not. First and foremost it’s a fast-paced and genuinely exciting thriller that also happens to have merit beyond being vastly entertaining. But entertaining it is and I couldn’t have been more engrossed reading it. I highly recommend it to anyone looking for an unusual but gripping and intense story. ...more

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Jul 20, 2014 Elyse Walters rated it it was amazing

Shelves: fiction

I LOVED IT!!!! Enormously provocative and hilarious.
The first half of the book, my husband and I read aloud together. (we were having a blast --stopping and having discussions) --- I finished the last half myself after he went to sleep.

Several negative reviews???? I do NOT AGREE!!! This book allows for DISCUSSION ---
Its too thin of a book to share much or give much away. Its best just reading it. It will only take a few hours of your time: FULLY WORTH the CREATIVE experience!!!!!

Here are a 'f ...more

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Jun 25, 2014 Candice rated it it was ok

Shelves: first-reads

I have so many problems with this book.

First of all the name is really misleading i thought this book was gonna be about religion? If you want to sell actual copies of this book change the name to "The People I Kidnapped and Why I am A Narcissistic Asshole with Grandiose Delusions". The book is entirely about man pain. Literally that's the book. And if it was written from the point of view where its like, yes, this guys an asshole, and were trying to show you that, and why its bad, i could have I have so many problems with this book.

First of all the name is really misleading i thought this book was gonna be about religion? If you want to sell actual copies of this book change the name to "The People I Kidnapped and Why I am A Narcissistic Asshole with Grandiose Delusions". The book is entirely about man pain. Literally that's the book. And if it was written from the point of view where its like, yes, this guys an asshole, and were trying to show you that, and why its bad, i could have liked it better. Or even if at the end he realizes hes a piece of crap then i could have liked it better. That in and of itself is my main problem with this book. Its written in a way were your not sure if your supposed to feel bad for Mr.Asshole. You're not one hundred percent sure if the author knows hes written someone with Entitlement problems or if he thinks he wrote an awesome hero character. He learns no clear lesson, at the end he isn't gonna change his perspective. Its just bullshit.
I can almost see why some people enjoyed this book because the other characters are interesting and the idea for this book is interesting. The guy takes everyone he thinks has wronged him and ties them up and asked them why? That is a neat idea. Whats shitty is he didn't even take someone who has been really wronged you took someone who just feels like people should have bowed down to him and the world should have been nicer. To be fair i could be judging this book to harshly it could absolutely be a book about Male Entitlement and how crappy that is but i don't think so. If it is i highly suggest changing the ending so that the point is clear. I would have loved this book if it was written from the point of view of someone who had been actually wronged in life but no we got someone with silly entitlement issues. I went threw and read some other reviews and i think it was summed up really nicely when someone said, you kinda wonder if anyone has sat the author down in a while and said "hey man this isn't very good".

...more

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Jul 28, 2014 Hell rated it it was amazing

I don't understand why so maybe people hated this book. I thought writing in all dialogue was interesting. Challenging to some, maybe, but we were told where they were, what it was like. We knew. I'm not a man. But I understood his plight. I don't think it was about middle aged white entitlement. I think he could have been any color, really. It was about people who have this feeling of displacement. That they have this energy, this something inside them that isn't exactly destructive but not exa ...more

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Jun 02, 2014 Josh rated it liked it

Shelves: 2014

I read this as I was flying into a place that was unknown to myself; love and retrieval of the future was my main focus and I succeeded in both and for that, I will always be thankful.

Now…my thoughts with this book and author.

Rating would have to be closer to a 3.5.

Dave Eggers is an interesting one. He always tends to bring up national/international issues within his books, but with a quirky sense of satire mixed in. With his newest “Your Fathers, Where Are They? And the Prophets, Do They Liv ...more

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May 20, 2014 Jessica Woodbury rated it really liked it

Shelves: best-2014-arcs, arc-provided-by-publisher, kindle, best-of-2014

I've read a lot of Dave Eggers books. (I used to own 3 different versions of SACRAMENT.) In some ways this is a return to form of some of his earlier novels. Loose, strange, not in search of any greater good but just there to tell an unusual story with unusual characters. And as much as I adore WHAT IS THE WHAT and his ambitious fiction, I can't deny the enjoyment of reading YOUR FATHERS, WHERE ARE THEY? and how quickly I was able to dash through it.

It is hard to review this book, it certainly d ...more

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Sep 02, 2019 Alice (Married To Books) added it

Shelves: read-in-2019, alice-reads-adult-fiction, did-not-finish

DNF at Page 72 (I don't leave star ratings to books I don't finish!)

This is a dialogue format story about a NASA astronaut who discovers he has been kidnapped and the one who kidnapped him claimed to know him from the past. They spend lots of time discussing and answering questions and accusations. The story was most definitely not for me. I wasn't a fan of the subject content and felt quite triggered by one exchange between the two characters during the section I read. I can see why readers wil ...more

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Sep 07, 2014 Leo Robertson rated it did not like it · review of another edition

Ahahaha!! That was one of the worst things I've read in a while.

You know, like it's all dialogue, which I guess is a technique he's partly biting from William Gaddis, who obviously did it wayyyy better! I was at least looking forward to a mess of speakers all at once but it's just one guy who pairs off folk and talks to them one-on-one, which makes it much easier to write than a novel written in standard form with even a single scene with many people in the same room, so it's far from daringly w ...more

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May 13, 2014 Snotchocheez rated it it was ok

1.5 stars

Easily the worst of Eggers' offerings I've read so far, YFWAT?ATPDTLF? is another effort of his to champion a "cause", and rally for the rights of the disenfranchised. Unlike vastly superior efforts like What is the What and Zeitoun, this time Eggers tries humorless Palahniuk-y gimmickry coupled with limp Mamet-esque theatrics to deliver his message. As my political viewpoints are similarly aligned to his, Eggers is preaching to the choir, but thanks to an utter lack of subtlety and (cu ...more

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Jun 26, 2014 Bob Lopez rated it it was ok

It was written with urgency; unfortunately, it's a kind of condescending urgency you would find in a college application essay where the kid thinks he should get into an Ivy League school but really probably belongs at a Tier 2 institution. Smug and self-satisfied, preachy ...more

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Jul 03, 2014 Madaline rated it it was amazing

Recommends it for: Alexandra Reddy

Recommended to Madaline by: Toby

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

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May 30, 2014 Sarah rated it it was ok · review of another edition

At least it was slightly more interesting (and a lot shorter) than The Circle.

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May 25, 2018 Patrick rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: books-read-in-2018

I totally get why people wouldn't like this book. Completely understand and appreciate it. A borderline magical realism book consisting only of dialogue with an ambiguous ending that leaves you wondering what's real and what's not (if any of it even is at all)? I get it, man. But holy crap is this right in my wheelhouse. Plot is overrated. "Before the Fall" was overflowing with plot, and it was kind of crappy. I'd much rather be immersed in a book full of subtle ideas and philosophical discussio ...more

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Dec 25, 2014 Kristen rated it really liked it · review of another edition

I'm going four stars on this because I really liked it, but I didn't looooOOOOoooove it.

I proposed this to my bookclub and it was turned down immediately, and I feel that was probably due to the long title and the fact that it's written entirely in dialogue. This can come off as gimmicky and probably pretentious, but if that's wrong, then I don't want to be right. A couple other reviewers have argued it doesn't have a plot, and while it doesn't have a plot in the sense of "here-are-a-lot-of-var ...more

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Aug 27, 2014 Beansoda rated it did not like it

Imagine Holden Caulfield all grown up, but 1000 times more impotent and whiny. This is the main character of this book. It starts with an interesting premise, but slowly just becomes a platform for complaining about the unfairness of life. Good grief, I've never hated a protagonist more, and not in a good way.

Since the book is entirely dialogue, clumsy attempts are made to fill the reader in on what is happening. He's kidnapped an astronaut--how do you know this? Because he exclaims to himself ...more

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Aug 12, 2020 Leo Robertson rated it liked it · review of another edition

Gave this another go because it's all dialogue and I'm all about plays and single settings at the moment :) Because I started filmmaking much later than I started writing, and if you can overcome the creative constraints of one location with a good script, your film is free and it takes the focus off of fancy cinematography, about which I know very little, haha! (Though with each project I'm gradually integrating more ways of using the camera, lenses, colours and lighting to tell the story, and Gave this another go because it's all dialogue and I'm all about plays and single settings at the moment :) Because I started filmmaking much later than I started writing, and if you can overcome the creative constraints of one location with a good script, your film is free and it takes the focus off of fancy cinematography, about which I know very little, haha! (Though with each project I'm gradually integrating more ways of using the camera, lenses, colours and lighting to tell the story, and moving away from my comfort zone of writing :D)

Well, this is an interesting experiment, and as odd a group of people that it puts in the spotlight, it does seem to have hit a nail on the head about a cultural issue. (The group in question I think is best summarised by this Onion article.) It pre-empts the rise of the alt-right and the meteoric rise of Jordan Peterson with all his slaying dragon stuff. I was fascinated by Jordan Peterson's theories for a good while before I realised that all my productivity and joy and meaning out of life, or whatever, comes from a place far less intense than this, like, "Your daily habits and actions force you away from hell and towards heaven, the place of maximally assumed responsibility. Earn your sunrise! Look after your community!" Like, omg, you come at me with that crap and I don't want to get out of bed, how's that?

So I'm not a member of the group of people who need culture to provide them with meaning. I like that the world is inherently meaningless and that I can create my own meaning out of it. And then change that meaning if it no longer serves me. I cannot be told what to do, and if anyone tries I usually end up doing either the opposite or nothing.

But just a few years later and the prescience of this book has become apparent. But structurally it suffers from a number of issues. Firstly, the characters that the protagonist kidnaps are pretty loosely associated with the narrative. The function that each character serves is not that clear. And the plot progresses with more kidnappings, with the addition of a new person in a new warehouse that the protagonist goes and talks to. Every conversation of unattributed dialogue is between two people at a time. Which shows the limitation of the unattributed dialogue format. Used by other novelists like Gaddis, Foster Wallace, McCarthy and (I believe) Puig, I think the effect is to remove all the bullshit out of the text and make characters live with their distinct voices, to create an immersive reading experience. But I find it a bit pretentious and unnecessary. There's also what I think is a very American enjoyment of rhythm in dialogue, where characters repeat expressions or questions to one another that I only ever find frustrating:
- Did you go there?
- Did I go there?
- Yes, that's what I'm asking you. Did you go there?
- No, I didn't go there.
For example. But these kinds of emphases I feel could just be cleaned up. If the style you have opted for is supposedly so lean, get there faster! (I remember reading Tarantino's script for The Hateful Eight--which I don't recommend doing--and into hour #3 they're like, "Have you ever had the best coffee in the state?" "No, but I would like to try the best coffee in the state" or whatever it is they say and it's like, Tarantino have mercy, this lifeless indulgent dialogue is killing me. Speed it the fuck up!)

However, what if the protagonist had kept kidnapping new people and putting them in the same warehouse, so that they could talk not only to him but to one another, and some interlocking mystery transpired in which they were all more directly involved, a bit like Inspector Calls? And they all worked together to convince the protagonist to quit his mission, and each time he went away and came back, they would use different tactics that they had discussed and agreed upon in his absence?

That's a longer and much more complicated book, but a 5* one for sure. This one is 3*. ...more

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Jun 16, 2014 jim rated it really liked it

Recommended to jim by: no one

If it was only for A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, I think I would still be blindly buying just about anything that Eggers writes. That I loved What is the What, You Shall Know Our Velocity, and We Are Hungry just solidifies his status as one of my favorite authors, so despite thinking that both Hologram for the King and The Circle were two of the weaker entries in his oeuvre I was excited to add Your Fathers… to my shopping cart without reading either (yes, that’s with a long “i”) sy If it was only for A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, I think I would still be blindly buying just about anything that Eggers writes. That I loved What is the What, You Shall Know Our Velocity, and We Are Hungry just solidifies his status as one of my favorite authors, so despite thinking that both Hologram for the King and The Circle were two of the weaker entries in his oeuvre I was excited to add Your Fathers… to my shopping cart without reading either (yes, that’s with a long “i”) synopsis or reviews… and then the package arrived…

I was, admittedly, a little saddened by the low page count, and I proceeded with some trepidation as the story began with such a flippant conversational tone that it had me thinking this would be the substantive heir of Hologram. Not that I disliked that book because it was poorly written or lacked coherence, but what I want from Eggers is the emotionally raw and deeply personal prose that initially brought me into his world – the kind of world with which I readily identified, characters in whom I became easily invested, and, most importantly, (pseudo-) fictional outcomes that had a not-at-all fictional effect upon my own (pseudo-) fictional reality. It was easy to find that world in those earlier works… perhaps too easy. Perhaps I had become complacent and forgotten how to look for what I wanted. Perhaps the words on the pages gelled so well that it became too easy to leave myself behind – instead of getting lost in the story I was just lost. Instead of waiting for “something to inspire [me] in some goddamned way” along with the protagonist/antagonist I had to be my own inspiration. I don’t know why that quote caused me to come to that conclusion, (maybe that’s the author’s magic) but I’m glad it did, as I think that change in attitude helped me find exactly what I was seeking in this brief collection of dialogs.

Initially it seemed like the main focus of this story was to uncover just how much we tend to rely on society, our parents, our teachers, our friends… our authors… to show us, give us, tell us, provide for us… fit us into a “larger narrative.” I didn’t realize it at the time, but it wasn’t the maimed but successful Congressman, the astronaut who had his dreams taken away, the parent, the policeman, or even the potential young love that really summed up what this meant. All of these people have something or are something that I want or I wish I could be, and each conversation uncovered a different facet of our inability to stand alone in an ever growing world that continually needs or wants us less and less. Yet it was the reformed/reforming and self-aware sexual deviant… the only one who, on the surface, was not a representation of what I wish I had… who appeared to have succinctly stamped the book closed a third of the way in. It wasn’t his extrapolation that, “I am one person, and my story is absolutely unique.” It wasn’t the affirmation of individuality in, “I don’t conform to any established modus operandi.” It wasn’t the introduction to which I alluded earlier that, “I’m not part of some larger narrative.” It was simply two words… “I’m me.”

Thomas, our “hero” if you will, had obviously reached a breaking point in his struggle to realize what “me” really was. We’re all flawed, but he could neither seem to understand that about himself nor forgive it in others, so he looked externally in an attempt to justify, to blame, and to find reason in a reasonless world. If only, he laments, “we’d been part of some universal struggle, some greater cause than ourselves,” then he, “would have turned out better, and everyone I know would have turned out better.” Eggers has broached the subject before. A passage from Velocity, which I’ve quoted many times before while in the thralls of my own directionless self-doubt, spells it out brilliantly: “I wanted so many times while driving to flip, to skid and flip and fall from the car and have something happen. I wanted to land on my head and lose half of it, or land on my legs and lose one or both. I wanted something to happen so my choices would be fewer, so my map would have a route straight through, in red. I wanted limitations, boundaries, to ease the burden… All I ever wanted was to know what to do.” It would be so easy if someone could tell us who “me” really is.

For as long as I can remember having known the phrase, “nature vs. nurture,” I have been a proponent of “80% nurture, 20% nature.” It is odd considering how innately amazing I am that I would have arrived at that conclusion, but I think I wanted to believe that my adoptive parents played a significant role in shaping who I became… that an adoption was something that really could change a person for the better. Not just living conditions, but who a person really was. I also wanted to believe that, some day, I might have the same opportunity to raise and shape someone else in, hopefully, an equally loving and nurturing environment. The real-world evidence, however, seems to contradict what I wanted to believe, and Thomas’s mother backs it up: “If you were raised in a standard two-parent family,” she says, “with all the money and stability in the world, you would have turned out exactly the same. Maybe with some superficial differences. You’d have slightly different clothes.” I look at that, and I wonder how it is that someone like me came from the home I did, and my foundation is shaken, and maybe we really are all just who we are from the very beginning. Is there hope to change? Is there hope to avoid your destiny? (Conversely, is there the horror of missing your destiny?)

I don’t suppose we can ever know, but it is Kev, the astronaut, shortly thereafter who voices the only possible solution to the problem using only a handful of words. He believes, he says, “in true love, and destiny, and love at first sight.” I used to believe in those things too, and then I didn’t. And then I did again, and now… now what? Kev’s solution? “Go for it.” Go for what? I don’t know, and neither do you, and neither does anyone, but go for opportunity; go for possibility; go for believing it can happen. Go for the “maybe,” and not the “never.” Go for it, and don’t forget that, “I’m me,” and, ultimately, that has to be enough. Go for it, and don’t forget, also, that, “You’re you,” and that is equally important. The pitfall this story opens up is the belief that your life’s story is also the story of those around you. Thomas’s actions come from, “a sense of knowing what’s right, and what should happen, and wanting to get started,” but he forgets that he can only “know” something for himself. We don’t know the future, and we certainly don’t know the hearts of others. Chance can look like fate, and destiny can look transient, and the danger comes from believing that our plan is, “the plan” when all we can ever know is that we owe it to ourselves to keep trying.

“I didn’t know I wanted you, but it’s all so obvious now that it was all leading up to this, to us. Now we have to complete it.” Thomas was lost at the beginning of this story… he lacked a sense of self, and a sense of his place in society, and then he finds it in a quiet wave across the sand, in the imperceptible movement of someone else’s hand in is, and in the smallest effort of someone willing to walk “20 feet” across the beach with him. What he didn’t understand – perhaps what I don’t understand – is just how selfish and vain we can be. How wrong we can be as soon as we step outside of ourselves and attempt to intertwine our lives with another. “Now we have to complete it,” Thomas says, but he’s forgotten that everyone is their own story. The reply is harsh and direct: “Not we.” In his fervor to finally rely on someone else… to believe that someone will let him rely on them, he forgets that there is a path that must be taken first. To “see something and want it” is not enough, and he doesn’t “want to do any of the steps to get there.”

We aren’t given people on whom we can rely simply because we exist, nor is there anyone we can blame for our shortcomings. We have to learn how to walk on our own before we can rely on another. And we cannot rely on anyone else until we are also willing to be relied upon. As satisfying and safe as it might feel to have your back-up or to have someone standing next to you, isn’t it infinitely better to know that you are (or could be) that to someone else? And, truly, isn’t the magnificence of that in the fact that someone else has to choose you and allow you to choose them at the same time? “We’re in here, and we’re safe.” Those are the luckiest people. Hail, Hail. ...more

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Apr 17, 2015 Ryandake rated it really liked it

lotta reviewers here crapping about how it's all dialogue, or how parts of it stretch credulity, or about how it's a long whine about white-boy privilege... ya, sort of. but.

the central issue of the book--which i take to be about how the US has abandoned the idea of doing anything Big (like going to space) and thus left generations of young, bright men with nothing heroic to do--well, it may not have the emotional punch of more desperate needs, but that doesn't make it meaningless. a writer can lotta reviewers here crapping about how it's all dialogue, or how parts of it stretch credulity, or about how it's a long whine about white-boy privilege... ya, sort of. but.

the central issue of the book--which i take to be about how the US has abandoned the idea of doing anything Big (like going to space) and thus left generations of young, bright men with nothing heroic to do--well, it may not have the emotional punch of more desperate needs, but that doesn't make it meaningless. a writer can examine all aspects of human life--they're all fair game. and i think he has a point with this one.

a lot of young men do feel that way--that they want to do something Big, and have an effect in the world, have their lives mean something. what's wrong with that? nothing, except that we don't live in those times. maybe by choice, maybe by circumstance (the only two frontiers left are space and the oceans)... but we don't live there.

our protag essentially kidnaps a whole bunch of folks, one by one, and seeks some answers from them. from the astronaut: why aren't we going to space? from the congresscritter: where did our big dreams go? from the teacher: why did you molest us (or, did you?)? from his mom: why didn't you keep me safe? from the cop: why are you shooting us? and from the "love"-interest: why won't you run away with me?

it's pretty easy to look at the list and see a great big whine in the making, but unless one has excavated a chernobyl-sized hole in one's memory and covered it over with concrete six feet thick, it's also really easy to see some fundamental questions there ought to be answers for. adolescents ask these kinds of questions, and adults poo-pooh them until they stop. that doesn't mean the questions aren't worth asking, or that the answers aren't deeply revealing about who we are as a people.

i don't take each of the kidnapees as a "real human"--i'm not looking for emotional depth in them (which is good, because it's not there). they're there to be the mouthpieces for society's answers to impossible questions. they're a function, really, not a character. and i'm totally fine with that, because having a "real human" would just muddy the issues our kidnapper brings up.

my only complaint about the book is that there really isn't any room in it for women. we have a representative Mom and a representative Love Object, and that's it. it probably wasn't in Eggers' remit for the book, but it's still kind of disappointing to me that the questions that young women ask never enter this discussion at all.

and one thing i think Eggers failed to make best use of: Fort Ord itself. the place is superlatively creepy and would have made a great character--28,000 acres of former artillery ranges, open space, dilapidated and crumbling buildings, parking lots being taken over by weeds. for his book, he understandably emptied the place and locked the "gates", but Fort Ord in daylight is a monument to waste and greed, and at night is full of ghosts and homeless folks. it's entirely emblematic of so many of the things he rails against in the book.

i listened to the audiobook version--it was very well performed. ...more

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Aug 25, 2016 Rob rated it liked it · review of another edition

Your Fathers, Where Are They? works more effectively as a thought experiment and an exercise in conversational flexibility than anything else, which marks this as minor Eggers. It's a fun little thing, and a quick, relatively breezy read, but basically Eggers sets out to answer these questions: Why are white males such dickbags? (and) What's missing in their lives to make them so angry and unsatisfied despite the fact they've had every advantage a person could want? I mean, it's a compelling que Your Fathers, Where Are They? works more effectively as a thought experiment and an exercise in conversational flexibility than anything else, which marks this as minor Eggers. It's a fun little thing, and a quick, relatively breezy read, but basically Eggers sets out to answer these questions: Why are white males such dickbags? (and) What's missing in their lives to make them so angry and unsatisfied despite the fact they've had every advantage a person could want? I mean, it's a compelling question (especially as one of the white males in question), but I find books that set out to do this kind of heavy lifting usually fail as solid narratives because they're primarily concerned with responding to a thesis instead of telling a story. This one isn't a failure – Eggers is too talented for that – but where a book like Eggers' masterful Zeitoun works because the message is embedded in its heartbreaking narrative, the message is the narrative in Your Fathers, Where Are They?, and once that becomes clear it's hard to get involved in the plot when we know that plot is just a means to try and answer a question.

The plot, such as it is, revolves around a man named Thomas. He's 34 and disaffected, angry about the shooting death of a childhood friend, and someone so unstable we learn he once tried to burn down a hospital to make a point. But now he's kidnapped half a dozen people and chained them in separate buildings in a decommissioned military base. The book is told exclusively in dialogue, as Thomas essentially interviews them (with the threat of violence right below the surface) about a variety of topics. From an astronaut, he wants to know what it felt like to work toward a shuttle mission for his entire life only to have NASA defunded just as he was on the cusp of career success. From a congressman he wants to know how and why even politicians with the best of intentions get sucked into the bureaucratic machine. From his 6th grade teacher he wants to find out if he and his friend were molested as children. And so on.

Watching Eggers play with dialogue and perspective in this way is fun, even if, as I said above, it becomes less satisfying once we clue in to what he's doing. It ends ambiguously, as it must, which is probably only going to annoy people who aren't already on board. I think Eggers fans will enjoy the exercise, but for the uninitiated, Your Fathers, Where Are They? will probably be more frustrating than anything else. ...more

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Jun 25, 2014 Kyle rated it it was ok

I guess the last three books by Dave Eggers could be considered a thematic trilogy; all of them seem to be trying to put their thumb on the current status of America. They are observant yet barbed works of fiction that in no way regard the United States as the "Land of the Free".

What sets this third book apart from "Hologram for the King" and "The Circle" is its form. Written entirely in dialogue, one could look at this as a script for a play or film, except there are no descriptions of setting ...more

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Jun 19, 2014 Steve Lively rated it it was amazing

WOW! this book is absolutely incredible! While Eggers abandons many fiction writing norms, he in turn has cleared away all the muck and has presented readers with a bare bones announcement (manifesto?) of the New Lost Generation. While exploring the perspectives of various characters under differing levels of stress, he successfully jars readers to pay attention and wake up to this seedy world in which we live. We can no longer just pine for simpler times---we must live in our day and deal with ...more

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Jul 07, 2014 Sarah rated it liked it · review of another edition

Poor Dave. He's gotten slated pretty hard core for this one. Yes, it's a bit preachy. Yes, it doesn't really seem to focus around any one point - the spoiled entitlement of the younger generation- inherent pointlessness of modern life- government waste- trigger-happy cops - long enough to make them really well or join them all into a coherent whole but goddammit if I didn't enjoy reading it anyway (3.5 stars if I could give the half points).

The all dialogue format has put some people off (and p ...more

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Oct 18, 2014 Alex V. rated it really liked it

Thomas is the everyman. The passenger. The victim to crimes being perpetrated on others. He is also a one-man Guantanamo. But he is also immortal in a way, maybe in every way one can be immortal. He at least gets people to remember him. He is certain he is on the side of morality. He is piteous and kind of a drag like all moral immortals and angry young men. He is doomed and bringing that doom to him as if he left a trail of crumbs.

Without spoiling anything, this is a book of dialogs Thomas has ...more

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Jul 07, 2014 Jenny's rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: fiction, books-i-own

What a fantastic and fun ride! This is my first David Eggers book. I will have to read more in the near future.
A middle-aged man kidnaps 6 people and takes them to an old army barracks where he questions them, trying to make sense out of his life and societies craziness.
The first part of the book has a sense of foreboding. He seems intent on his quest for answers. And you're wondering how far he will go to get them. Though the first kidnapping is well planned, he soon devolves. Kidnapping anot ...more

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About Dave Eggers

Dave Eggers

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Dave Eggers is the author of ten books, including most recently Your Fathers, Where Are They? And the Prophets, Do They Live Forever?, The Circle and A Hologram for the King, which was a finalist for the 2012 National Book Award. He is the founder of McSweeney’s, an independent publishing company based in San Francisco that produces books, a quarterly journal of new writing (McSweeney’s Quarterly ...more

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“You see pictures of Buddha and he’s sitting, reclining, at peace. The Hindus have their twelve-armed elephant god, who also seems so content but not powerless. But leave it to Christians to have a dead and bloody man nailed to a cross.” — 23 likes

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