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 A dizzying book
There is an image at the beginning of this book, of two brothers driving along Highway 1. They are flying on the edge of the world, going too fast, with only the guardrail between them and the ocean below, and they feel dizzy and free and reckless. It's an image that captures part of the soul of the book. There is another part of the book, that I think more of as the body, where there are two boys living together, one boy older than the other and trying to be the parent. He feeds the younger boy peanut butter and doesn't know anything about laundry, and wishes he could get laid more.
And the thing that makes this book live up to its audacious title is that the older boy goes about the whole thing, the project or experiment or act of shepherding his brother safely into adulthood, with complete intensity and seriousness. He does it while he is raising himself with equal intensity, building his own life.
It is outrageous to have written a memoir when you were in your mid-20's, more outrageous still to have been absolutely right to have done so.
I really liked it, but it's not for everyone - 4 1/2
Maybe I'm judging this differently because I'd heard nothing about this book before randomly picking it up at the library (I thought the name "Eggers" was funny). I didn't have high expectations or anything, but I... actually really liked it...
"A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius" has some wonderfully special moments to it. First off, Eggers writes in a really casual, easy-to-read manner, and pretty hilariously. Too many memoirs about sad things focus too heavily on the sad things. Eggers goes at the lighter side of things, looking through a slightly more realistic microscope. I get sick of memoirs (or books, for that matter), where realistic/funny parts are far and few between. That's not how life is. Conversations aren't always deep and meaningful (and how can a person writing a memoir even remember conversations so clearly? At least Eggers made it clear that he half-invented some conversations), sometimes they're shallow, pointless, and silly.
There are other interesting things to AHWOSG. The descriptions of wannabe hipster young adults in the 90s may not appeal to a lot of readers, but it's pretty entertaining to look at this hipster attitude and the San Francisco culture. Again, a lot depends on the reader's personal opinions. If you're not big on guys just telling you about their real life, the good, the bad, the ugly, the boring and the meaningful, you may not want to read a memoir about exactly that - Eggers' life.
What I like in the end is that it's all very readable. Eggers turns his life almost into satire but still makes everything seem funny and true. I laughed out loud at too many parts in this book (and the prelude is truly genius). There's a lot which younger readers (present) can relate to, whether it's the shying away from responsibility too often, the insecurities, the randomness, the need to belong, or just the dumb things people do and have to go through. The book may be longish, but it goes by quickly and while the ending is sort of random (kind of like the whole book), by the end, I felt like this was my life or at least that I was part of the story.
Maybe it depends on who is reading AHWOSG. I really liked it, enough to recommend it to friends. I can see my parents thinking it's stupid. I can see my sister laughing hysterically throughout the funny parts and crying during the important ones. Is this a grand work of literature? No. It's a chill, funny memoir that tells a pretty sad and interesting story. It's well written, honest, funny, and enjoyable. Also an easy read.
So it's a pretty warm-bordering-hot recommendation for younger readers (late teens) or readers okay with the style. I'd suggest older readers of a generation above Eggers and more investigate thoroughly before reading AHWOSG. It's still a great book (memoir), but some may not quite appreciate it. For that, a 4 1/2 star rating.
 Worst Book I've Read in a While
This book is a pile of pretentious drivel. Eggers is so self-absorbed, he has lost contact with the real world. I haven't read something so bad in a long time. I should have stopped after the first section concerning his parents' deaths, because it just goes way, way downhill from there. I want the hours I spent reading this book back.
A.H.B.W.O.S.G. Review
At age 21, Dave Eggers's mother and father die of unrelated cancers within just 5 weeks of each other. The memoir, A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, follows Dave's journey as both a young adult in search of love and freedom, and as a "single mother" to his newly-inherited little brother, Toph.
The memoir opens with a witty list of "Rules and Suggestions for Enjoyment of this Book", where in a borderline-sarcastic manner, Eggers dismisses the importance and relevance of half the book. Even in the preface, (which was read, despite his suggestions), his clever and ferocious voice bursts through the pages, and straight into the imagination of the reader.
In A.H.W.O.S.G., Eggers doesn't just sketch general ideas of what he experiences, he vividly paints a picture of specific life events; all his thoughts are splayed out on the pages, as if nothing was cut back. The reader can then enter his head, and hear his inner-thoughts, feel his raw emotions. "We wash our hands and come over... -maybe we forgot to wash our hands- and lean over in the usual way, holding her arm, all while her eyes are following us, at least on eye is following us..." (342). His brutally honest story-telling, yet maybe not-so-honest dialogue, will astonish and entertain any reader.
The beginning sections of the book describe Dave's mother's slow passing: both in-depth and disturbing, the reader automatically feels uncomfortable yet captured by the twisted, almost overly-descriptive imagery, "The tumor is rotten fruit, graying at the edges. Or the insects' hive, something festering and black and alive, fuzzy on its sides..." (32).
Eggers weaves different writing styles in and out of the book, "spicing up" the already expansive and intense work. Often out of cynicism, flowcharts, script, and sketches are added, including those of staplers and house space to slide in socks. Dialogue varies from long, deep conversations, (often accusations), to simple greeting exchanges amongst friends.
Also, Eggers provides breaks from intense, "heartbreaking", often rant-like passages. His choice of events may seem random, but always add further entry into his mind. Painful and depressing events are easier to cope with with Eggers' comedic easiness and sarcasm. But he becomes sullen by injecting feelings like paranoia and caution into what would otherwise be considered "simple" choices.
When Eggers leaves his brother with a babysitter, (something not normally seeming so terrifying), a reader is overflowed with shared feelings with Eggers. "This is stupid. We don't need this kind of risk...But I have to do this. There is no risk. But there is risk. But the risk is worth it. I'm so, so evil." (126) Without telling the reader he is distressed, the reader knows, especially after frantically following his train of thought.
As made obvious after completion of this book, Eggers used all events he viewed as important to his life. Even ones that put him in a bad light were used, "You have been determined, then and since, to get this down, to render this time, to take that terrible winter and write with it what you hope will be some heartbreaking thing" (119).
The voice, writing style, and expanded incidents in this memoir truly makes it a heartbreaking work of staggering genius.
The Work of A Staggering Genius
"A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius" is Dave Eggers' moving memoir chronicling his journey after the death of both of his parents, and his struggles of trying to find himself while caring for his adolescent brother, Toph. Eggers tells his story with extraordinary voice and is able to reveal his true thought processes through writing that more often sounds like the mumblings of his inner-conscience rather than a finely articulated memoir. But "A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius" is nothing but a finely articulated memoir. Eggers passionately conveys his conflicts between old and young, adult and child, responsibility and immaturity, brother and parent and son - struggling to find a happy medium as a twenty-some year old full-time guardian of his brother. Eggers speaks to the reader as if we are right there with him, allowing us to witness the good, the bad, and the ugly. He manages to truly create a dynamic image of himself that we can't help but feel is genuine; however, not always diplomatic.
Eggers cleverly gives levity to his otherwise somber situation. Through both this wittiness and his straight-forward revelations that he would "be bored without Toph", we are able to grasp that, despite the overwhelming responsibility of raising an 8 year old, going to parent/teacher conferences, making lunches and dinners, and trying to be the parent that everyone expects him to be while keeping up his own parents' legacies, Eggers can find the good among the bad and the ugly. Inspiringly, Eggers still maintains his "fun-loving big brother" status, but always feels the pressure that he's not the role model he should be. Eggers creatively reveals his secret paranoia that he will be found out for not taking care of Toph like a parent should and reveals his guilt that he can't do so. In the same creative, swift, sub-conscience "blabbering", we also learn that Eggers is constantly questioning people's acceptance of him and Toph "as a couple", and always imagining the worst possible outcomes for him and Toph: murder, kidnapping, drowning. Uncertainty that probably stems from having the worse-case scenarios happen to his mother and father years earlier and the lack of control that Eggers had to save either of his parents is strongly contrasted in the new control he is given in determining Toph's childhood and future. Through every up and down, Eggers reveals his life in terms some may find too harsh and candid, but in terms that never deny the ugly truth.
Heartbreakingly, Eggers loses his parents right before our eyes all throughout the book. Starting with their actual death, then with the moving from Chicago and selling his parents' home, the loss of the only remaining artifacts he has of his parents': his father's wallet and a teddy bear that evokes feelings of his mother, and the lack of closure he gets after his parents' deaths because there was no funeral and no ashes to scatter. Eggers doesn't seek closure until the very end, when he revisits his hometown, finds his mother's ashes and scatters them; finally setting himself free from his dead parent's grasp.
Eggers cleverly gives levity to his otherwise somber situation. Through both this wittiness and his straight-forward revelations that he would "be bored without Toph", we are able to grasp that, despite the overwhelming responsibility of raising an 8 year old, going to parent/teacher conferences, making lunches and dinners, and trying to be the parent that everyone expects him to be while keeping up his own parents' legacies, Eggers can find the good among the bad and the ugly. Inspiringly, Eggers still maintains his "fun-loving big brother" status, but always feels the pressure that he's not the role model he should be. Eggers creatively reveals his secret paranoia that he will be found out for not taking care of Toph like a parent should and reveals his guilt that he can't do so. In the same creative, swift, sub-conscience "blabbering", we also learn that Eggers is constantly questioning people's acceptance of him and Toph "as a couple", and always imagining the worst possible outcomes for him and Toph: murder, kidnapping, drowning. Uncertainty that probably stems from having the worse-case scenarios happen to his mother and father years earlier and the lack of control that Eggers had to save either of his parents is strongly contrasted in the new control he is given in determining Toph's childhood and future. Through every up and down, Eggers reveals his life in terms some may find too harsh and candid, but in terms that never deny the ugly truth.
Heartbreakingly, Eggers loses his parents right before our eyes all throughout the book. Starting with their actual death, then with the moving from Chicago and selling his parents' home, the loss of the only remaining artifacts he has of his parents': his father's wallet and a teddy bear that evokes feelings of his mother, and the lack of closure he gets after his parents' deaths because there was no funeral and no ashes to scatter. Eggers doesn't seek closure until the very end, when he revisits his hometown, finds his mother's ashes and scatters them; finally setting himself free from his dead parent's grasp.
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