Pajiba

I tried. But I didn't get caught up in this book and never finished it.

I read this again a couple of months ago. The first half of the book is insanely good. I am a huge fan of emotional turmoil covered with flippant remarks and actions (see: all conversations between he and Toph). Even the faux-interview chapter was great, but it set up the worst part of the book. The parts about Might Magazine drag and make Eggers come off as preachy and self-centered, but it magnifies his desire for people to look at him, owe him, feel for him. Overall, I take the good with the bad. Even though he was an inexperienced writer at the time, he was smart to get all of this down before it became more distant memory and less emotional experience. If he waited to write his memoir until he was a more polished novelist, much of the raw emotion might not have made it to the page.

I dated a few cougars in my day and loved it. No drama, great sex and I was not paying for everything all the time. It was really chill. Try this out:
**== Cougarster.com ==**
But let me tell all you young guys that want a cougar. eat your veggies and hit the gym cause they will ware you out.

never finished HWoSG. eggers can suck it.

on a related note: a friend and i always scream out "YOU SHALL KNOW OUR VELOCITY!" when we are drunk.

I had the same problem you did--when he got to his career, it just bored the ass off me and I stopped reading it. I think I even sold it back to Half Price Books.

Oh and figgy, don't sweat it, Eggers is my age and I had a hard time relating, but I figured it was a regional thing as much as anything else.

I do love the work he's done with public schools and McSweeney's. For that, I will always like him.

But I don't read his memoirs/novels. I just don't dig his style.

Well said, Martin. Thanks for saving me the time it would have taken me to write a much less coherent post.

Don't care how jealous I sound. This book came out when I was in my last year of journalism school trying to feed myself while maintaining creativity without passing out from hunger. Tried reading this in a bookstore and got so angry that this guy and his "craft" was making money I couldn't open it again. And it's not because I'm a hipster, it's not that I hate everyone who writes a better portfolio than I do. It's that this was on par with some celebrity "writing" a book and making money for it. If you're young and supposed to be a genius for your age or time or whatever, write something that will last fifty years from now. We'll still be reading Catcher in the Rye, but this guy will still look like a douche. Oh, and before everyone else starts pointing fingers at me, The Brief Wonderous Life of Oscar Wao was worth the Pulitzer Prize. THAT is a young author with genius in him. Writing in circles or not using punctuation to make it "edgy" is not talent!

I like Eggers's short pieces a lot and I think he's a talented writer, but I could only bear about 1/3 of AHWOSG. The book is bloated and inefficient - and not simply because it's long.

Scorzi - agreed about Brief Wondrous. Tremendously well-written book that manages to be funny, horrifying, colloquial, and classical.

I love this book, and was totally blown away by it the first time I read it. It was like seeing Pulp Fiction in the theatre for the first time, realizing that this guy had figured out a new way to write a book, making everything-- including the goddamn About the Author and copyright page-- interesting and hilarious.

I saw Eggers speak a few years ago, and he was fantastic. Here's a guy who lost both parents (and later, his sister), had to basically skip his early twenties to raise his brother, found celebrity with AHWOSG, and still managed to remain a cool, engaging, down-to-earth guy. He's neither arrogant nor self-pitying, just a guy you'd want to hang out with.

I can appreciate people not liking the book, but this review read like a high school book report.

SackmementoCalifornia: His sister died too?! Christ, that's terrible.

Speaking of deck-stacking, the title of this book stacks the cards before you get past the cover.

Don't bullshit.

I don't like sob stories. That's what I have whiny acquaintances/colleagues for.

I guess if we're not in-the-know, this title smacks of hubris, which actually might cheapen the actual experiences he endured. It's the literary equivalent of a pity fuck.

We get older, we lose parents (or they lose us), we find jobs or go broke, we get older; life can be difficult. Overcoming adversity is great and we want to yell it from rooftops.

Book deal, please.

I guess you all glossed over rules 4-6 of the "Rules and Suggestions for Enjoyment of this Book" which nicely address all the criticism. I will quote it because it is short enough to be an extract and not a copyright issue.

"4. Actually, many of you might want to skip much of the middle, namely pages 239-351, which concern the lives of people in their early twenties, and those lives are very difficult to make interesting, even when they seemed interesting to those living them at the time.

5. Matter of fact, the first three or four chapters are all some of you might want to bother with. That gets you to page 123 or so, which is a nice length, a nice novella sort of length. Those first four chapters stick to one general subject, something manageable, which is more than what can be said for the book thereafter.

6. The book thereafter is kind of uneven."

I did enjoy the book, and did get a little bored later on, but I was warned and prepared. Dave Eggers came to speak at my college about 8 years ago? He was fantastic--seamless transitions from reading You Shall Know Our Velocity to speaking. Someone in the audience brought a Frisbee and asked if he'd do his one-handed catch while cartwheeling. He pulled it off, in front of 200 people. Also, he looks 15 years younger in person. In other words, I'd bang him.

One poor about-to-be-senior honor student called me today from that lovely college. I warned her that is foolish to follow your dreams, because even 5 years out of college, dreams don't pay back your student loans, massive credit card debt, and drinking, so wise up while there's time and find out what major and what career path are going to give you money. Unless you are a lucky genius or experience a tragedy like losing both parents within weeks of each other while you're in your early twenties that frees you from a conventional path, the safe route isn't going to get you where you want to be in five years. I really hope she didn't misinterpret and decide she should figure out how to lose her parents tragically. I shouldn't answer my phone during rush hour commute.