I like books. I like reading them and I like talking about them. Title: A Visit from the Goon Squad
Author: Jennifer Egan
Setting: New York City mostly, but also California, Italy, and Africa, across many years.
Characters: So many characters that are intertwined, but also isolated by chapter. Time is a character. So is Music. The temporary fleeting aspect of life and living are the biggest character of them all!
Main Problem/Conflict: When he was 20 years old, Pete Townshend wrote the lyrics: “I hope I die before I get old.” 46 years later, Mr. Townshend still tours with Roger Daltrey. Does he consider himself old? Does he wish he was dead? Music and culture have changed significantly in the nearly half-a-century since he wrote those words. Where does The Who fit into the world today?
That’s kind of what’s happening in this book.
Spoilers ahoy!
Conclusion: There isn’t really one? I mean the books is snapshots from the lives of several loosely connected people. And the realism in this book is steeped in the fact that, for the most part, these are really ordinary people. They’re not on an epic quest, there isn’t a great mystery to solve, there are no mistaken identities or intrigues or marriage plots. It’s their lives. Their normal, extraordinary yet mundane lives. There isn’t a real plot arc, so there isn’t a real conclusion.
Except, I guess, that the beat goes on, the song remains the same, etc., even if the drummer changes (a la Spinal Tap).
Did you like this book/Would you recommend it to a friend: I read this book because a work-friend recommended it to me. We actually traded books, he got Something Wicked… in exchange.
I went on to recommend Goon Squad to two other friends.
It’s quick, it’s fun and it’s different. You’re not following one character or one plot line, there are lots of threads that come together to make one over-arching narrative about life. Each chapter throws you into a different time, place, and narrative voice, and that’s pretty cool.
So yeah, go ahead and read this. Why not, right? I mean, has anyone ever been worse off for reading something (not including the Necronomicon)?
