Motherless Brooklyn: Amazon.ca: Books

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Customer Reviews

161 Reviews

5 star:		(91)
4 star:		(34)
3 star:		(21)
2 star:		(13)
1 star:		(2)

Average Customer Review

4.2 out of 5 stars (161 customer reviews)

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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars You call this noir?, May 14 2004

By	A. Alcalay (Brooklyn, NY USA) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Motherless Brooklyn: A Novel (Paperback)

As a crime fiction reader, writer, and Brooklynite, I don't understand the positive reviews of this book. To call it "hardboiled" or even whisper it in the same sentence as true masters like Jim Thompson or David Goodis, whose characters, though "quirky," as Lethem would call them, are part of a real nightmare while Essrog...belongs with Frank Capra in a romantic farce set in a foreign country. At least the people who laud this book seem to be unfamiliar with the likes of Woolrich or Willeford or Spillane, which is a good thing for Lethem. If his book were to be put alongside real crime fiction, people would be able to realize the sham that Motherless Brooklyn is.

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3.0 out of 5 stars Plot, what plot, April 30 2006

By	Steve Z. McCauley "szm" (Montreal, QC) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Motherless Brooklyn: A Novel (Paperback)

Like others in this forum, I found this book to be a huge disappointment. The writing, as others have pointed out, was good, as was the character development of Lionel, and the portrayal of his Tourettes. But that's where the book's positive points come screetching to an end. The only other sympathetic character in the small cast was the victim Frank. Other than that, blah. Kimmery had a shot, but ended up being an outcast. Surely, with a character like Lionel there would have been someone who could have seen through his Tourettes and accepted him for what he was. But the nastiness of other's opinions of him was just too much for me. Why would Jane be so vindictive and nasty?

I guess it comes down to a single point. If you like the so-called "hard-boiled" detective genre, then you will probably like this. For me, it was just a clone of Raymond Chandler.

I gave it three stars because it deserved more than two for the beauty of the writing. If I based it solely on plot it would surely get no more than 1 star from this review.

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4.0 out of 5 stars four stars for the Tourette twist, Jun 19 2004

By A Customer

This review is from: Motherless Brooklyn: A Novel (Paperback)

Otherwise, I would just give it two or three stars. But if Lethem does not have Tourette's, he still does an unbelievably authentic job of giving us its quirks - especially the stuttering, bizarre free association wordplay - in an eccentric and likeable character. I wish there had been another character I wanted to root for, however.

The detective storyline is pretty standard. What distinguishes it is its main character whose disorder threatens to defeat his attempts to solve a murder case at every turn. This may not be enough to keep some readers' interests, but if you're interested in psychological twists, this one is as impressive as any I've come across. I only wish the same originality had been given to the rest of the book.

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Most recent customer reviews

5.0 out of 5 stars Essrog Essgdog Is Good
Lethem has created a sympathetic, intriguing, and wonderfully whimsical alternative to the hard-boiled detective. Read more

Published on Jun 13 2004 by mmcwatters

5.0 out of 5 stars Highly unusual
Lionel Essrog is the center of attention in this riveting novel by Jonahtan Lethem--he (Lionel, not the author) has Tourette's Syndrome, that unfortunate and uncontrollable desire... Read more

Published on May 11 2004

4.0 out of 5 stars A minor masterpiece of character
In another writer's hands, the concept of a narrator suffering from Tourettes', and trying to solve a murder could have been a gimmicky mess. Read more

Published on May 7 2004 by Rocco Dormarunno

4.0 out of 5 stars Interesting twist on the detective novel
This book is hard to categorize. Is it a detective novel? A satire of the detective novel? A literary journey through the complexities of language? Read more

Published on May 2 2004 by H. Huggins