by Jennifer Egan.
There wasn't really a plot, which isn't really a problem for me.
It wasn't exactly chronological, which I love.
70-some pages were PowerPoint slides --> which was awesome and rekindled my interest in visual and digital storytelling.
Each chapter of the book was a short story, all connected through their associations with other characters in other chapters. This format reminded me of Olive Kitteridge
and The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
, which were also collections of related short stories marketed as novels. (What other books are like this? I love this style).I did not like the characters and I'm not all that interested in the music industry but I did enjoy Egan's writing style and novel format.
Reading this made me think differently about what it means to write a novel.
What books have made you think differently about the novel?
2 comments:
Hey Anne! Well said about Goon Squad. I, too, have recently finished reading it, and for me it was one of those pick-up-put-down-pick-up again type books because I also really didn't like the characters. I also enjoyed the writing style, so it was interesting to process the storytelling itself. Check out "Skippy Dies" by Paul Murray. It's not in the short story telling of a novel genre, but the characters are engaging, and it's told over a series of three novel length books in a set... but it isn't a trilogy. It was another format I took a shine to.
Hi Steph! I feel better knowing that I'm not the only one who felt the characters were unlikable.
Thanks for the "Skippy Dies" recommendations...I'll check that out!
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