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brisingr's review against another edition
3.0
Read for class; has so much more sense and depth once discussed, of course.
jackgoss's review against another edition
dark
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Addiction
laurenmichellebrock's review against another edition
3.0
I finished Denis Johnson’s The Largesse of the Sea Maiden last night. I read it in a day and a night. It wasn’t what I expected—though, to be honest, I had no idea what to expect. I never read Denis Johnson before this. The collection was completed sometime before his passing, which makes the stories feel ominous while reading. Especially considering the narrator’s last lines in Triumph Over the Grave: “It’s plain to you that at the time I write this, I’m not dead. But maybe by the time you read it.” And he was...
The stories are doused in issues of death, imprisonment (both governmental and self-inflicted), and repentance. They are about writers and ad men and junkies. Though I didn’t feel particularly connected to any of the characters, Johnson’s writing style compensated for what I failed to appreciate in these emotionally wayward men. It wasn’t the men themselves that were very interesting, but the way in which Johnson voiced them.
You could feel the power of their obsessions and the underwhelm of their apathies. Each story, involved and painstaking as it was, seemed to be written in the way of one of his poets in Doppelgänger, Poltergeist—“You just get out a pen and a notebook and let your mind go long”—as though Johnson, with this book, could leave nothing to chance. Which I found admirable, and is probably why I kept reading. The stories may not have been earth-shattering in their execution or resonance, but they were honest.
The stories are doused in issues of death, imprisonment (both governmental and self-inflicted), and repentance. They are about writers and ad men and junkies. Though I didn’t feel particularly connected to any of the characters, Johnson’s writing style compensated for what I failed to appreciate in these emotionally wayward men. It wasn’t the men themselves that were very interesting, but the way in which Johnson voiced them.
You could feel the power of their obsessions and the underwhelm of their apathies. Each story, involved and painstaking as it was, seemed to be written in the way of one of his poets in Doppelgänger, Poltergeist—“You just get out a pen and a notebook and let your mind go long”—as though Johnson, with this book, could leave nothing to chance. Which I found admirable, and is probably why I kept reading. The stories may not have been earth-shattering in their execution or resonance, but they were honest.
blaineduncan's review against another edition
4.0
It’s a bit of a fault of mine that I shy away from short story collections, even those by authors I adore. There just is something about not having chapters to create natural pauses and not living with the characters over the course of the two hundred pages. I need something that keeps me coming back. With short story collections, I tend to put the book down for too long after finishing one of the tales. My preference would then lean towards reading short stories individually, outside of a collection. But when I heard that Denis Johnson was getting a posthumous release of short stories less than a year after his death from cancer, I was excited: Johnson’s Jesus’ Son, a renowned volume of stories, were so connected that they could almost be considered a novel. His novella Train Dreams is one of the best works in recent American prose.
The rest of the review here:
https://thealabamatake.wordpress.com/2018/02/07/the-finality-of-the-largesse-of-the-sea-maiden/
The rest of the review here:
https://thealabamatake.wordpress.com/2018/02/07/the-finality-of-the-largesse-of-the-sea-maiden/
caffee's review against another edition
challenging
reflective
medium-paced
2.75
I liked the last story best but wasn't blown away by any of them.
stevienixit's review against another edition
Had one story left and had to put it down for a while. I’ll come back for the last one when the time is right. Denis Johnson’s particular flavor of beautiful melancholy isn’t quite right for this chapter of my life, but I’m glad I read what I did. Helped me jump out of a reading slump and remember what I loved about writing back when I first read Jesus’ Son all those years ago in college.
heyep's review against another edition
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
booccmaster's review against another edition
dark
emotional
funny
mysterious
reflective
sad
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
3.75
megadeathvsbooks's review against another edition
2.0
Eh. I wanted to like these. It was a great cast reading them and I've heard rave reviews. But they just seemed like more stories from old white guys dealing with their mortality. And yes, I know they deal with it, as we all do. But I've read too many of these types of stories during my education. I'm ready for something else.
madif's review against another edition
reflective
medium-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
3.0