Reviews tagging 'Suicide attempt'

The Candy House by Jennifer Egan

10 reviews

nerdandahalf's review against another edition

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challenging dark medium-paced

4.25

This book covers some fascinating ideas about digitalizing and sharing culture.  Early on, it’s discussing the genesis of an idea to upload and share memories, and the unexpected consequences of the technology.  Then, it goes a bit further back, to show the genesis of the idea that sparked the idea for the technology. 
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minkkmuse's review against another edition

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challenging funny reflective medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.5

 this book is so outstanding. obsessed with the intricate worlds egan weaves and the meandering paths between characters she traces. sharp, smart, incredibly funny, and deeply profound.  the full cast audiobook is particularly immersive. 
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ygoliver's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.25

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emburs's review against another edition

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dark emotional reflective slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

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beccasherman's review against another edition

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dark reflective medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

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bethtuba's review against another edition

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challenging funny hopeful reflective slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.5

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nettleviolet's review against another edition

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slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? N/A
  • Strong character development? N/A
  • Loveable characters? N/A
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A

2.75

This book is not what it is advertised as. It's not bad, per se. Some might really enjoy it, if you like a book with no plot, theme, main character or setting, which just made it feel really pretentious to me. It reads more like a series of short stories where the main character in each short story is somehow related to one, or many, of the characters in the other short stories.

Each story is well-written and the characters are interesting enough. However, there was no real overarching theme, as the description might apply, and though the Own Your Consciousness tech exists, it's not central in any way to the plots of any of the stories.

And, in one of the last chapters of the book, the author just threw in a completely unnecessary transphobic sentence, which was very off putting. 

Somehow this book ended up on Barak Obama's top 10 list of the year and I can now say that he and I have very different taste in books.
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hinkleh's review against another edition

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4.75

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thebakerbookworm's review against another edition

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challenging reflective medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? It's complicated
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

Despite having the subtitle "A Novel," this book is actually a collection of short stories...they are all set in the same world and some of the characters have cameos in multiple stories, but other than that, each story could be read on its own, or out of order. It was confusing to me at first, because I kept expecting to return to the first story, and then the second, etc., but once I understood that they were short stories, I actually enjoyed the book more.

Maybe I would've understood it more if I'd read the Goon Squad book first? Not sure, but I loved some of the stories, found others boring, didn't like some of them. I think my favorite was the one written entirely via letters. I enjoyed the complexity of the characters that are presented, though most of them make questionable decisions and aren't very likable.

I did really appreciate the commentary on memories and social media and just how much of yourself you're willing to share with strangers. A lot of food for thought. I mean, if you could upload all your memories online and be able to access them at any time, and actually watch them as you experienced them, like a movie, but they would also be available for anyone in the world to watch them, would you do it?

Thanks as always to Libro.fm, Simon and Schuster Audio, and the author for my ALC.
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ashley_hm's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional reflective sad tense slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

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