From the Bookshelf of Queereaders…
Find A Copy At
Group Discussions About This Book
No group discussions for this book yet.
What Members Thought
I was expecting to enjoy this book as it was well-recommended, but I found that I LOVED it. It is one of the best books I've ever read. The writing is beautiful, sense details lyrical and enriching, the story makes is clear and compelling. The author nails many aspects of the gender transition experience so well that I wanted to extract whole passages of it, to remember. Beautiful, beautiful book.
There were only two things, really, that I found flawed in the book. 1) Cal's epiphany moment of st ...more
There were only two things, really, that I found flawed in the book. 1) Cal's epiphany moment of st ...more
I really enjoyed the three generations of this book. The story of a family immigrating the United States as they fled the conflict of war. Knowing that the narrator was living a life that they found satisfying, if not completely wonderful was nice for a novel about a nontypical gender person. So many books about nonbinary individuals end in tragedy, and, although there is tragedy as in everyone's life, it was nice to know that this character was going to overcome.
I would read this book again and ...more
I would read this book again and ...more
An Orlando for the modern day, this is not. Eugenides is a great writer, and clearly good at researching his novels, but as another reviewer wrote, he is "trying to accomplish too much" in this book, and the result is a story that is too short to do justice to the many themes, plot points and characters he brings into it, but already long enough for a not very quick read. I had the strange sensation that Eugenides was laughing at me when he wrote the book-- everytime I would fall into the groove
...more
I had such high hopes for this book that received so many positive reviews. But I was never able to finish it. Which is sad because I stopped right when I actually started liking it a little more (which was about an hour left of it). I just couldn't handle the excessively long narrative. That's the only bad thing about audio books, at least if I had it in writing I could have skipped hundreds of pages of description, but not so much in the land of audio.
...more
I just did not enjoy this. It was long, too. I probably got through a good deal of it believing it would have to get better, and then finished it b/c I get to be like a dog with a bone. I like to finish books unless I literally hate them. Don't 'member for sure, but think part of problem was Eugenides did not help me to feel anything for the protagonist. And I'm pretty easy to get emotionally involved.
...more
I really, really enjoyed this book, which I listened to on audio book. I went in with really low expectations because my sweetie rated it one star and hated the narrator. But I loved him, and found the book overall to be totally entertaining. I agree with the critiques about the gender politics -- this was more fluffy than serious to me.
Jan 03, 2010
Kelly
marked it as to-read
Jan 12, 2010
April
marked it as to-read
Apr 12, 2010
Renee
marked it as to-read
Sep 28, 2010
K.N.
marked it as to-read
Jun 28, 2011
Justin Difazzio
marked it as to-read
Dec 28, 2012
Yzabel Ginsberg
rated it
liked it
·
review of another edition
Shelves:
lgbtq,
contemporary
