Jeffrey Eugenides

Advantages: Excellently written. Good insight into Greek/Turkish relations
Disadvantages: None

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Ciao members have rated this review on average somewhat helpful

Advantages: wonderfully written, compulsive
Disadvantages: none

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Ciao members have rated this review on average somewhat helpful

Advantages: Made me thankful my parents had allowed me some freedom as a teenager!
Disadvantages: I really did have tears in my eyes at several points in the story.......made my mascara run!

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Ciao members have rated this review on average somewhat helpful

Advantages: Beautiful, poignant and haunting modern fiction
Disadvantages: Not one for those who like a light-hearted read

...Book reviews can do one of two things; either alienate their potential readership by being too elusive and unwilling to pass comment (aside from saying the book is brilliant), or explaining every last detail of the plot to the point where any potential reader cannot see the point of reading the book! I will attempt to avoid either of those pitfalls in my review, so please read on! Jeffrey Eugenides debut novel has been described as 'A Catcher In the Rye for our age' and I would say that this assessment isn't far off. The book tells the chilling fate of five sisters living in a 'normal' east-side American neighbourhood. The sad and chilling destiny of the young women is recollected through the collected memories of the boys who lived in the same road as as the girls when they were young. The artefacts they collect (diaries, personal... Read review

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Advantages: well researched, well written
Disadvantages: none

...Had you noticed my dear chow friends how long I have been away for? Well I've had a lot of time on my hands, and therefore done a lot of reading, so expect a veritable glut of reviews, the first of which has to be 'Middlesex', winner of the 2003 Pulitzer prize for fiction. You know what's it's like at airports, those couple of hours in departures, shuffling aimlessly from shop to shop, hoping to magically pass the time. I always end up parting with cash in the bookstore, because somehow it's justified when you're off on holiday. This time I dithered over the lovely stacks of books, and ended up with 'Ignorance' by Kundera, 'Platform' by Houellbecq, and 'Middlesex' by Jeffrey Eugenides. Middlesex follows three generations of the Stephanides family, from the grandparents driven out of Asia Minor Greece to the grandchildren in Modern day... Read review

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Advantages: easy to read, emotive, well written
Disadvantages: depressing to read

...This was a great book, which was well written by Eugenides and easy to read. I took this book away with me on holiday last month, and found it so addictively absorbing that i finished it in one sitting! Despite it's macabre subject matter, it was not only saddening but comical and heart-warming at the same time if that is at all possible. A quote from the Observer called it 'a Catcher in the Rye for our time' and i think this praise is well deserved. It did remind me of Salinger's work, through this tale of youthful experience. This book was recommended to me by a friend, who described it as 'one for the freezer' meaning that she needed to freeze the book as it scared her so much, however, I found this book neither scary or grusome, but light-hearted despite dealing with such a grave matter as teenage suicide. I found the narrator... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average somewhat helpful