A Visit from the Goon Squad
Jul 26, 2010 at 11:48 AM I just finished this book and loved it. A Visit from the Goon Squad by Jennifer Egan.
It's a collection of related short stories (so it's perfect for someone like me with a short attention span) about people who work in the record industry. Like, in the first story you meet A and it mentions her boss, B. Then the second story goes on to tell you a little more about B and mentions someone named C. The third story is about C and how he knows B. Eventually one of the stories mention A again. It's amazing, amazing, amazing and Jennifer Egan is an awesome writer. All of the stories are told in different ways, in different voices. Some are third-person all knowing, some are first-person... one is told through a power-point presentation. This isn't done to be gimmicky; it just happens to be the best way to tell each story.
Read it! I was hooked by the third story.
Karyn
By the way, this book and Bad Marie were recommended to me by the lovely Emma Straub, author of the awesome little novella Fly-Over State.
I bought Emma's book at my local independent bookstore, BookCourt, without realizing she lives in my neighborhood and works there part-time. I loved it so much I searched her out on the internet ("Karyn Bosnak, internet stalker, nice to meet you") and we soon became Twitter and Facebook friends. And then one day I saw her in BookCourt and said, "Hi, Emma. I'm Karyn. We're Twitter friends." So anyway, now Emma and I are real friends and she's so nice! Buy her book too!
Reader Comments (2)
I read Bad Marie after you posted about it on Twitter. (does this mean if I meet you IRL I can use that line? Tee hee!) That book effed with my head. It left me with this weird feeling after I was done that was hard to shake. I guess that's a sign of good writing, eh?
Yes! I didn't want it to end.