ILX Book Club - Jennifer Egan: A Visit from the Goon Squad

Funny thing is, I can't remember any of the things people are referring to here - rape? Internet?

ha i had the exact same thought!

It's not a good sign, is it? Glad I'm not the only one.

This just in

--

Call for Papers

43nd Annual Convention, Northeast Modern Language Association (NeMLA) March 15-18, 2012 Rochester, New York – Hyatt Rochester Host Institution: St. John Fisher College Keynote speaker: Jennifer Egan, 2011 Pulitzer Prize winner, A Visit from the Goon Squad

Threads like this remind me how baffled I can be by the Pinefox's approach - I wonder how I'd be able to read anything if I were put off by writing about experiences alien to me, or without being able to suspend moral judgement about fictional criminals committing fictional crimes.

The bloke predicting the internet (p.199) turned out not to be doing it tht explicitly, more in a mystical way; but I'm pretty sure we are still supposed to think that's what he's doing.

I don't understand the plot line in ch10 of the Sasha character telling the Rob protagonist that he had to pose as her bf because she was being watched by a detective. eg:
1. he wouldn't believe it
2. even if it were true, it would make just as much sense for her to be seen NOT having a bf

- in all the whole thing seems preposterous. Probably it will be explained further in some way, but I don't think that such an explanation is likely to make it more plausible, as experienced in ch10.

But the Rob guy's unrequited affection seems plausible.

though ch10 wasn't great, it was probably one of the best chapters so far.

ch11 opens in Italy. someone way upthread said this was the highlight so perhaps I can hope for something good.

Oh, I assumed the point was she was just saying that so she cd get a snog out of him. The thing being that he didn't realise that she liked him as well as him liking her. Which is what makes his death tragic, and causes at least part of her life to be dedicated to him. Again, the second-half's obsession how we are connected through what we give in remembrance.

I didn't know he had died.

I certainly didn't get the point that you got about their relationship.

That might be because you have read the rest of the book.

assuming that what you say is correct, Fizzles - it is still preposterous that someone (she) would concoct that detective story and conduct a relationship on that basis.

But again, I'm still reading the book. It seems that I have much to discover.

Oh. I wouldn't be sure I'm correct. I just vaguely remember a bunch of people doing stuff. That would be my synopsis of an awful lot of books if you asked me, which you'd be sensible not to.

The paragraph about sports on pp.208-9 is possibly my favourite in the book thus far. The exclamation marks ('not a sport!' - this genuinely gently amuses even this Goon Squad sceptic) point up the fact that this (chapter or start of chapter) is the closest the book's trail of modes has come to Lorrie Moore.

I don't remember any of those bits either.

It's like I haven't read the book at all.

You may have been too busy reading ROCKABILLY.

Postage-free ordering with 22% discount (currently) from here: http://www.bookdepository.com/Open-City-Teju-Cole/9781400068098

Fucks, sorry, wrong thread AND it looks like spam. That's for the US edition of the next selection, Open City by Teju Cole.

I just finished this.

More of a collection of short stories than a novel, but I enjoyed almost all of them. The final, SF chapter was the only one I didn't like. (It's set in around 2030 and they're already changing the earth's orbit! I balk at this.)

Seemingly misjudged sentence on p.218:

'thronged with what had to be college students (strange how they looked the same everywhere)': now, this initially struck me as a somewhat tired, lame truism, a would-be-interesting observation that might be written off as Ted's.

The odd thing, though, is that the sentence immediately specifies
'boys and girls in black leather jackets riding on Vespas, lounging on Vespas, perching and even standing on Vespas'.

This (certainly the Vespas, probably the jackets, not to mention the fact that they're all Italian) surely belies exactly what the sentence has already gone out of its way to say in that ill-fated parenthesis.

In the end, having said positive things about it previously, I couldn't make much sense of that chapter (11): the characters' feelings, motivations relations stayed opaque to me.

Now on p.261.

Not a great paranthesis admittedly, but surely the point is that despite the local details they look the same. The paranthesis is lazy I guess because it doesn't explain why despite the local details they look the same. For some reason Martin Amis' description of his 'thin, breakfastless face' as a student, springs to mind.

This is like watching a brave marathon runner stagger to the finish line btw.

You people still reading this?

No, I'm watching the pinefox read it. I can't read anything else until he finishes it. The suspense is killing me.

Ha.

>>> surely the point is that despite the local details they look the same

I don't think this is quite the sense that I get from it, Fizzles ... it first says they all look the same, then goes on to make them sound outlandishly specific. I think the thought of the sentence is less coherent than you're giving it credit for. I suppose I think Egan had one thought, then another, and didn't notice that they don't really go together.

Amis's phrase jars for me because being a student certainly didn't put me off eating. And it's kind of meaningless really as a description (I think we agree?).

I like the idea of being watched, as a reader, by a chimp.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2281/5799661836_383400c935.jpg

I have been on the bottle a bit recently, admittedly. Very good picture of me last Thursday morning iirc.

(Oh and the Amis thing was about himself rather than being a general application, that was me who did that - I can still remember only a total of three or four things I ate at university.)

I sometimes wonder what on earth I ate at university.

Students don't look the same everywhere, at least not from country to country. Apart from perhaps they all look like idle perishers.

If that chimp were to be given pencil and paper he would draw the bars chicken wire of his own cage.

If that chimp were given pen and paper, he would write a better version of A Visit from the Goon Squad.

>:[ i thought you liked it, alfred!

Search: Bob Newhart, "An Infinite Number of Monkeys."

I thought I said I didn't!

i guess it was wishful ilxing on my part

You seemed to like it whilst reading it and then afterward said that it left no lasting impression and was 'vaporous.'

You got it.

I didn't eat very well at university. Like PJM I feel distant now from whatever I ate then. I was very ignorant and could not cook well. But I was young enough not to be damaged by it, then.

That is a good bunch of comments about the chimp.

I went up the road to my local pub and reached p.320 or so. The powerpoint chapter is indeed good for motoring through lots of pages. I thought that the technique worked quite well, but I didn't understand, or have much sympathy with, the mother's account of why pauses in rock songs are fascinating. Maybe she was just being indulgent towards her child. But, the theme of rock pauses seemed quite Freaky Trigger. I started to picture Peter Baran writing an article about them.

Oddly, the current chapter which is quite SF is quite interesting. At this rate, I might finish the book, in the future.

The pauses in rock thing gives the whole enterprise a sheen of Geezaesthetics. Every time I hear a Pause in Rock now I think of that book. I think this may be its only lasting effect.

In retrospect, the PowerPoint chapter seems sadder than the rest.

In retrospect I think she should have done each chapter in the style of a programme from the Microsoft Office "Suite". With the final chapter from the perspective of Clippy the Microsoft Office Assistant.

'It looks like you're trying to write a book'.

"Like"

and also

"LOL"

and also

"lightbulb on"

I get that except for the lightbulb.

(Also I think the only Office Suite thing I am familiar with is Word - or is Power Point part of it also?)

I'm looking forward to the Excel spreadsheet chapter.

Gantt charts people!

The Evening Standard today reviews this book.

Says it should have won the Orange Prize, is the best new novel of the year and everyone is recommending it to everyone else.

It describes the plot, or the sequence of chapters.

I recognized the description but I could not feel much in sympathy with the favourable things that the review said about the book.

i just finished reading this book yesterday night! and i'm not even in yr book club! i guess i just wanted to say hi and wow this book is awesome and made me feel like writing more things that i really enjoy writing.
it had a DFW kind of charm but with a more heartrending, optimistic sense of humour about lyfe

pinefox, I'm glad that your indifferent reaction to this uberpopular book has not seemed to make you feel like you have been outcast from life's feast.

welcome, rrrobyn!

nice to see rrrobyns positivity!

after reading this book my gf has gone on an egan reading spree

'this (pulitzer-winning) book should have won the orange fiction prize' is such a peculiar statement

that marathon runner should have won the egg and spoon race at my nephew's creche (woman's division)

But Orange is much more money & a far bigger deal in British medialand - I thought Pulitzer was just a journalism prize till a few years ago. It is a weird thing to say, but it feels more like 'this emmy-winning sitcom should have got a bafta'