pacifickle 's review for:

A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius by Dave Eggers

4.0

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Once I got past the enormously long sentences, this book is a charmer. The protagonist (Dave Eggers), age 22, loses both of his parents suddenly to cancer, and becomes the guardian of his 7 year old brother. He outlines their menu (lots of Ore-Ida fries), diagrams the way to maximize the distance you can slide on hardwoods in your socks (seriously), and they have food fights in the house. It's sweet but not too sweet, and whole, and handles death in a real way, the way books never handle it, the way I think when someone around me dies, the thoughts I would never say out loud. The book goes on over the course of a few years, as Dave and his brother figure out their lives.