Reviews

The Gum Thief by Douglas Coupland

reesecar13's review against another edition

dark emotional funny hopeful inspiring lighthearted relaxing sad fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

katerr's review against another edition

4.0

I liked it, but it may have been because it is a Coupland book.

kricketa's review against another edition

3.0

good, but not the best from coupland. to be fair, i don't really like epistolary novels. and i don't really like to think about life losing all meaning in middle age.

i love, love, LOVED roger's story "glove pond." it was amazing. and hilarious. the letter from his writing instructor at the end also totally killed me.

colin_cox's review against another edition

5.0

Douglas Coupland's The Gum Thief is a complex web of narratives, letters, confessions, and journal entries that sits comfortably within a postmodern sensibility that challenges conventional notions of what a text can (and should) be. At the end of The Gum Thief, the book's protagonist, Roger, receives a scathing critique of the novel itself, which disrupts established notions of authorship. In this critique, his instructor writes, "Locationwise, your book takes place in your own day-to-day world, and that's wrong...Staples? I can go there any time and experience it myself. I don't need or want art that tells me about my daily life. I want art that tells me about somebody--anybody--else but me" (273-274). What this instructor misses is a question that Coupland grapples with in many of his books: as an aesthetic form, what does the novel have left to offer a reader? Furthermore, and from a structural perspective, what can the novel offer or contribute that it hasn't already? Considering The Gum Thief from a formalist perspective explains why Coupland offers his reader a little bit of everything from the novel's stylistic history. Epistolary blends with conventional narration which blends with unreliable narration (which, at times, appears quite reliable) which blends with journal entries and so on. Coupland's formal playfulness reflects postmodernism's preoccupation with lost authority, and skepticism toward authority quickly emerges as a dominant theme throughout the novel itself.

I have returned to The Gum Thief four or five times since reading it in graduate school. I do so in moments of intense vulnerability because Coupland's narrative playfulness and structural instability produce, ironically enough, relief. The novel's vulnerability coupled with my own, double-negatives my anxiety, creating an odd sort of tranquility.

thoranorak's review

dark reflective sad fast-paced

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

2.0

kentons's review against another edition

4.0

I haven't read any of his books before and thought this was a really cleverly written story. I thoroughly enjoyed it and will definitely have to read some more of his books.

fateleanor's review against another edition

funny mysterious medium-paced

4.5

A strange but compelling and humorous story. It was written in an interesting style and peppered with another story throughout.

davidscrimshaw's review against another edition

4.0

This book has a novel inside a novel and then... there's a novel inside the novel that is inside the novel!

I don't really know if that's a good thing. I was not very interested in the third level down. I cared about the characters in the main novel. Maybe it was deliberate that I wouldn't care so much the further levels down.

The main novel characters know each other from the Staples they work at. That was definitely fun.

And I'm happy to report that this book was in my big pile of books to read and now I can put it in one of the nearby little free libraries.

staywild23's review against another edition

3.0

I had a serious love/hate relationship with this book. Most of the time I enjoyed the "book within a book" Glove Pond, more than the actual book. I think what it really comes down to is I can't tell if I love or despise Douglas Coupland's writing, since this is the first book I have actually read of his. It is so overly witty and every character has far too much energy to constantly spout off their witticisms. I found it tiresome most of the time and yet....I did finish it! So there must be something there.

Maybe someone else can better explain to me how I feel because I can't seem to understand.

hexa's review against another edition

1.0

This is a stupid book and I didn't enjoy reading it. It took me months to finish, just because the idea of reading this book seemed pointless and boring. I hated the book and probably wouldn't have read it or even picked it up if it wasn't a gift.