The Corrections [Hardcover]

My wife and I are reading this book right now and I can tell you this book will challenge you. Can't deal with that? Try another book. In fact, might as well forget books entirely and watch some more reruns of "Everybody Loves Raymond." Remember that episode when Debra gets PO'ed at Ray? Yeah, I love that one too. That's probably more your speed.

For the rest of you. Take the Gary character, for example. When you first meet him, the battle lines on him between my wife & I are clearly drawn. I felt sorry for him. Now midway through the book neither of us can figure him out, if he's a jerk, or if Caroline is being a bee-eye-tee-you-know-what.

The book is hilarious, too. You'll be reading along and suddenly be smacked in the face with Franzen's humor, and the best part is he doesn't warn you, draw attention to it, anything. Makes me wonder how many other jokes I've read through without catching them already.

Great book. Buy it. No whiners!

Without question, Franzen is a very gifted writer. His prose and descriptive style were refreshing. Although I don't particularly agree with the philosophy of life/worldview that permeates the novel, he is obviously intelligent and thoughtful, which makes for an interesting read. I also found his characters to be realistic and captivating, and I found the book to be hard to put down.

BUT ...

What is the deal with all of the sexual hangups and screw-ups? Was the graphic detail necessary in the telling of the story? Did it make me see Chip any differently to envision him sniffing a chaise lounge looking for "DNA"? Seriously, has quality writing come to this? It seemed like I couldn't turn two pages without having something sexual come flying out of nowhere. This is obviously a dysfunctional family, but please. Some of the sexualization of the novel was very thoughtful and introspective, but often it seemed like a gifted pubescent teen was trying to write a novel while struggling with raging hormones that showed up on every other page.

My other criticisms are a bit more idiosyncratic, but worthy of mention. As a midwesterner who has lived (for a summer) in the Baltics, I was annoyed with his descriptions of both. What is the deal with the East Coast perceptions of the Midwest? At least Franzen grew up in the Midwest, although his descriptions of things "midwestern" were hardly symnpathetic. Franzen doesn't have a monopoly on this thinking as it has been in evidence from the legend of the Hatfields & the McCoys up through the present in films such as Fargo. Apparently, it makes the urban East Coast feel better to imagine this seemy, dark side intermixed with breath-taking ignorance in all of the inhabitants of that large, netherworld that they call the midwest. It's the same mindset that sees a novel based exclusively in Manhattan as general fiction, but anything based west of Pennsylvania as a form of one regional genre or another. I don't know that Franzen even meant to have some negative portrayal of what it means to be midwestern, but I can't help but notice how it seems to resonate among the few East Coast readers whom I have heard comment on it.

As for his descriptions of Lithuania, well, he picked the wrong former Soviet republic to denigrate. Much of his description of the gangland post-Soviet economic structure would have been much more suitable elsewhere in the former Soviet Union. Relatively speaking, Lithuania has been quite stable.

Three stars seems like a fair overall rating because Franzen is a very gifted writer who tells an interesting and, at times, captivating story, but I just didn't see the originality that so many critics seem so ga-ga over. "A golden ring in the snout of a pig" is the analogy that lingers in my mind.