Brooklyn's Books of Wow

As I procrastinate in grading papers, I came across this highly aggressive review which states how this crop of BBoW books are trite and something yadda yadda...

The only book I have read of the books being "reviewed" is "A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius" by David Eggers. While the book has its flaws, it is still, in my opinion, a wonderful and wonderfully original work. And when I see the author say:

Maybe I’m taking literally what’s meant to be sarcastic, but beneath the sarcasm lays real disdain. This is most evident at his sister’s wedding, a presumably significant event in Eggers family annals. Instead of extending the lattice, however, the sole, incredibly tepid description he gives of the groom is that he’s “a nice young man named James.” As for the other guests, Dave thinks, “I am not them. I am . . . a hundred years old.”

This, in my opinion, is a complete misread of the story. It makes the review sound as if he hadn't read the rest of the book. Eggers says he want to be the lattice, but that he can not/does not know how to achieve it. And the reason that Eggers says, "I am not them. I am...a hundred years old" is because of his situation. He was thrown into raising his little brother while still being a bit of a child himself.

A critique like this reminds me of Roland Barthe's "Mythologies" in which Barthe points out how critics claim to "not understand" something-- and in that-- they imply that there is a deficiency in the writing, rather than in their critique. The problem in Eggers's book is not in its hyper self-awareness, but in that Eggers uses that hyper-awareness too much.

And yet, I feel it works even if it is a bit too much shtick. AHWSG is one of the funniest and most original books I have read in a real long time.

I can't comment on the other books this guy is reviewing as I have not read them, but going off of what he says about the Eggers book, I have to assume he is just as myopic in reviewing those books as well.