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Book Review: "A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius" by Dave Eggers
I suppose the question to ask with this book is does it live up to the hype? Dave Eggers' first novel, "A Heartbreaking
Work of Staggering Genius" has received pretty much nothing but awestruck reviews from all over since its release back in
1999. After reading so many raves on the book and after a personal recommendation, I decided to give in and see if
it truly was what it claimed to be. Heartbreaking? Staggering? Genius? Well...
Let's be clear here, the book is good. Very very good. I would say in its finest moments, it certainly lives up to its
title. The book basically reads as a memoir... a memoir on crack. We learn the story of Dave's life... how his parents
both die of cancer a month apart (heartbreaking) and how he moves from Chicago to California to raise his little brother
Toph pretty much on his own. We also follow the story of the upstart "Might" magazine (staggering genius) that he
and his friends start while living in San Francisco. Mixed into this are stories of an audition for MTV's the Real
World (a part eventually given to Judd in season 3), an eventual meeting with Judd and Puck from said "Real World", a
hilarious account of being accosted by some hispanic teenagers, and an interesting search for his mother's lost ashes.
At its core, this book is about grieving. Eggers always puts up the front of things being alright in the wake of
losing his parents, but laughing it off most often gives way to rage. The book is wonderful on that level alone,
a study on orphans and grieving. The book works on other levels too though... for one, it is one of the funniest books
I have read in a long time. Eggers' style is interesting in that characters come completely out of character at times,
often to hilarious effect. The reader is never really able to guess what might be coming next, which makes the book
quite difficult to put down. At over 400 pages, I normally take a week at least to read a book of that length. I finished
this one in 2 days.
Back in college, I took a course on Postmodern Lit where we read the works of Douglas Copeland, Paul Auster, Thomas Pynchon,
and several others. It was alright but a lot of the stuff we read seemed to be trying so hard to be cool just for the sake
of being cool. There didn't seem to be a whole lot underneath. "A Heartbreaking Work" is so good because it isn't just funny
and cool because it can be... it has something to say as well.
If this book were a film, it would have an R rating for language and some sexual situations. If those things offend you,
you might want to skip this one.
Review by Greg Adkins
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