Rating: 
Summary: *Miss. O* O.K. I guess... *Miss. O*
Review: If you want to read a book that uses delicate plotting to subtly expose many dimensions of the thinking of its two leading characters, you will find The Tattooed Girl to be a tour de force. Unfortunately, the two characters are people you may not identify with because they seem drawn more to create a hypothetical case (of the sort so fondly debated in laws schools) rather than people you have met or know. As a result, the book's powerful message in favor of connection and sharing falls short its potential punch. The reader is likely to come away glassy-eyed from the book's events, but not redirected in her or his behavior. Joshua Seigl is a man trying to hide from his own success, and finding it harder and harder to do so. In the course of the book, you'll find out the many reasons why he is hiding. The time comes to take on an assistant to help him with his papers, correspondence and occasional odd jobs around the house. Seigl rejects all kinds of qualified male applicants due to his own hypersensitive nature. Then, one day he meets an odd young woman struggling to do a simple job in a local bookstore. Despite her lack of qualifications other than being non-threatening, he hires her. Her submissiveness allows them to get along on the surface, but she develops a strong dislike for him that emerges into virulent anti-Semitism. Ms. Oates then takes us on a journey with them as they drop their public faces and begin to connect with one another, and the result is that their views of one another begin to reflect the inner realities of one another. Ms. Oates's theories are that we usually judge one another rather harshly based on appearances, behavior and our historical sense of what's what. Instead, she encourages us to drop our guard and let others know who we really are . . . and take the time to find out who they are. Think of this as being like "Get acquainted with others as you would like others to get acquainted with you" as a variation on the Golden Rule. Although there's an obvious religious message here, Ms. Oates mostly leaves religion out of her story . . . probably to make the potential lesson more accessible to people of all faiths and non-faith. This book would make a fine choice for a sophomore English class in high school as a launching pad for many fine discussions about the dangers of categorizing others. As I finished the book, I began to wonder to whom I had not properly explained myself . . . and to whom I had not properly listened. That was a valuable benefit from reading the fine writing in the book.
Rating:
Summary: Brilliantly Plotted Thought Exercise about Hate and Abuse
Review: If you want to read a book that uses delicate plotting to subtly expose many dimensions of the thinking of its two leading characters, you will find The Tattooed Girl to be a tour de force. Unfortunately, the two characters are people you may not identify with because they seem drawn more to create a hypothetical case (of the sort so fondly debated in laws schools) rather than people you have met or know. As a result, the book's powerful message in favor of connection and sharing falls short its potential punch. The reader is likely to come away glassy-eyed from the book's events, but not redirected in her or his behavior. Joshua Seigl is a man trying to hide from his own success, and finding it harder and harder to do so. In the course of the book, you'll find out the many reasons why he is hiding. The time comes to take on an assistant to help him with his papers, correspondence and occasional odd jobs around the house. Seigl rejects all kinds of qualified male applicants due to his own hypersensitive nature. Then, one day he meets an odd young woman struggling to do a simple job in a local bookstore. Despite her lack of qualifications other than being non-threatening, he hires her. Her submissiveness allows them to get along on the surface, but she develops a strong dislike for him that emerges into virulent anti-Semitism. Ms. Oates then takes us on a journey with them as they drop their public faces and begin to connect with one another, and the result is that their views of one another begin to reflect the inner realities of one another. Ms. Oates's theories are that we usually judge one another rather harshly based on appearances, behavior and our historical sense of what's what. Instead, she encourages us to drop our guard and let others know who we really are . . . and take the time to find out who they are. Think of this as being like "Get acquainted with others as you would like others to get acquainted with you" as a variation on the Golden Rule. Although there's an obvious religious message here, Ms. Oates mostly leaves religion out of her story . . . probably to make the potential lesson more accessible to people of all faiths and non-faith. This book would make a fine choice for a sophomore English class in high school as a launching pad for many fine discussions about the dangers of categorizing others. As I finished the book, I began to wonder to whom I had not properly explained myself . . . and to whom I had not properly listened. That was a valuable benefit from reading the fine writing in the book.
Rating:
Summary: *Miss. O* O.K. I guess... *Miss. O*
Review: In this novel by Joyce Carol Oates, an aging ex-prodigy and author is in need of assistance, and starts to (secretly) try to find an assistant. After going through several interviews, Joshua Seigl isn't happy with any of the possible candidates. Seigl gave up searching until he met Alma Busch in a bookstore. She seemed like a good person for the job; although it turns out she is illiterate. This book tells the tale of this mixed-matched pair from a third-person writing of each of their views on their lives - interaction with each other and others. I suppose if I were older, this book might be more appealing, for the writing is good. It is a bit advanced I guess - that or the stress of finishing the book before a deadline - for my age because it felt difficult to read at times. I recommend this novel to older, more advanced-level-reading students, but not to younger, less advanced level students. -- >> Kathy White
Rating:
Summary: It appeared a little contrived and superficial.
Review: My experience of reading this novel epitomizes the meaning of the expression, "The higher one's expectations, the greater the disappointment". No doubt Joyce is a great writer, but "The Tattooed Girl" certainly falls short of her best efforts. The writer seeks to explore the themes of anti-Semitism, the fleeting and impermanent nature of one's identity, and the irrational origins of hatred. The lead-up to the conflict took Joyce almost two-thirds of the book, yet the resolution was a lame attempt at hitting home her intended message.
"The Tattooed Girl" is likely to be on the reading list for Joyce's diehard fans, but for others, it may end up as a book which failed to move. Go for Joyce's other novels instead. I believe they will salvage your impression of her.
Rating: 
Summary: Oates in her rare form again
Review: Oates has done it again. Just when we thought she was going soft with middle aged romances and blonde biographies along comes another modern, gruesome, gothic novel. In the tradition of Man Crazy and the Rosamond Smith serial killer novels, Oates returns to some of her favorite territory, the stalker with murder in mind. Here the usual territory takes a decidedly literary twist. The object of all this attention being a classical author, very much like Philip Roth, coincidentally the man Oates has singled out for her dedication. Poor Roth, or Joshua Seigl in the book, is in for a tough time. Oates has several villains in this piece, a barely literate girl deliciously contrasting our literally self-absorbed hero, a psycho boyfriend, and a sister from hell to torment her secluded writer brother. Get set for a fun ride, and some thoughtful musings about evil's random victims. Oates has been occupied of late with rewriting some of her past literary works, The Garden of Earthly Delights, and them, but she is not too preoccupied to continue her now grand old tradition of creating a spooky thriller. I just want to know when she has time to eat.
Rating:
Summary: Good, not great
Review: Others have outlined the plot and characters - so. One customer/reviewer stated that a good Oates novel is better than the detritus otherwise available. Yes. However, the story might be compared to a film by an important, but aging director: Masterly crafted and with signature moments of brilliance, yet with something missing. This is not, in my view, a novel about either hatred or anti-Semitism; these appear more as vehicles within a greater story. Yes, the novel involves a Jewish man (one who denies that he is Jewish), his sister, and a gentile woman who is apparantly anti-Semitic. Yet it isn't enough for a character seething with apparant prejudice to chant over and over (and over) again: "I hate hate hate the Jew." Here is where emotional depth is not established. Moreover, I would go as far as to say that Oates' conception of anti-Semitism - a reality of horrendous scope and importance - is somewhat lazy. In addition, while I am no East-Coaster, the protagonist, Joshua Seigl, seems convincing as a far older, established man rather than the fading, late-thirties prodigy he is conceived to be. Meanwhile, the other important character, the barely literate Alma Busch, does not become fully delineated until the novel's final pages, and I do not believe this was by design. The Tatooed Girl is more centrally a story about fear - fear of failure, or of ridicule - at both ends of the spectrum of success; and of shame - shame for who one is, for what one has done or failed to do. While there is an electrifying moment of confession, one which is linked to the Holocaust, revealing duplicity and cowardice, the driving force behind The Tatooed Girl is personal alienation, destitution (temporal or spiritual), and the unlikely bond formed between two very different outcasts.
Rating:
Summary: Good, not great
Review: Others have outlined the plot and characters - so. One customer/reviewer stated that a good Oates novel is better than the detritus otherwise available. Yes. However, the story might be compared to a film by an important, but aging director: Masterly crafted and with signature moments of brilliance, yet with something missing. This is not, in my view, a novel about either hatred or anti-Semitism; these appear more as vehicles within a greater story. Yes, the novel involves a Jewish man (one who denies that he is Jewish), his sister, and a gentile woman who is apparantly anti-Semitic. Yet it isn't enough for a character seething with apparant prejudice to chant over and over (and over) again: "I hate hate hate the Jew." Here is where emotional depth is not established. Moreover, I would go as far as to say that Oates' conception of anti-Semitism - a reality of horrendous scope and importance - is somewhat lazy. In addition, while I am no East-Coaster, the protagonist, Joshua Seigl, seems convincing as a far older, established man rather than the fading, late-thirties prodigy he is conceived to be. Meanwhile, the other important character, the barely literate Alma Busch, does not become fully delineated until the novel's final pages, and I do not believe this was by design. The Tatooed Girl is more centrally a story about fear - fear of failure, or of ridicule - at both ends of the spectrum of success; and of shame - shame for who one is, for what one has done or failed to do. While there is an electrifying moment of confession, one which is linked to the Holocaust, revealing duplicity and cowardice, the driving force behind The Tatooed Girl is personal alienation, destitution (temporal or spiritual), and the unlikely bond formed between two very different outcasts.
Rating:
Summary: 3 1/2 Stars: Flawed Souls Yearn to be Healed
Review: To say that JC Oates's THE TATTOOED GIRL is populated with flawed souls and monumentally flawed people is to understate the case. The two main characters, old-money wealthy and educated Joshua Seigl and Alma Busch (the tattooed girl of the title) are at the end their respective ropes: Seigl, a JD Salinger-type recluse living off the reputation of his first novel which deals with the survivors of the Holocaust, who can't quite bring himself to complete any of his many works in progress and Alma, a wanton, perpetually down-on-her-luck young woman who carries the marks of her past and of her lifestyle on her face and body.
THE TATTOOED GIRL is not by any means one of Oates's strongest recent works but it certainly has it's moments and patented Oatesian scenes such as this one dealing with food and eating: "Her rapidly chewing mouth...Saliva glistened in the corners..." It has always been interesting to me that Oates, thin and trim in real life, has always written of food and eating in such a manner: uncontrolled, sensually even orgasmically. And she does it here once again.
Seigl and Alma reach out for each other but not at the same time. In fact one of the weakest character motivations of this novel has to do with Anna's hate of Seigl because he is Jewish (which technically, he isn't having been born to a gentile mother) and her perceived notion that he thinks himself privileged: "Mostly that's why she hated him... he didn't know what he owned."
Throughout most of the novel Seigl is completely unaware of Alma's real feelings about him and Alma likewise of Seigl's towards her. The connection is not made until the last few pages when it is too late for both of them to revel in the kind feelings, love and ultimately the redemption of their love for each other.
THE TATTOOED GIRL is Oates at her very darkest. And even though the writing is often glorious and redolent with the aroma of truth, this is not Oates at her best: some of the characters are sketchy and could have been left out and some are retreads of characters from earlier novels, especially Alma. (Alma could be exchanged with Ingrid in MAN CRAZY or Anellia in I'LL TAKE YOU THERE. They are one and the same.)
But a good Oates novel is better than most authors best and anyone interested in contemporary fiction would be hard pressed to find better, more aggressive writing of this quality anywhere else.
Rating: 
Summary: About a Girl - but not an Oprah pick
Review: Why isn't this an Oprah pick? It doesn't fit the Oprah formula of victimized heroines rising above their horrific circumstances to transform their lives. The Tattooed Girl, Alma Busch, is more anti-heroine than heroine. She cannot think for herself, but instead incubates the thinking of her pimp/boyfriend Dmitri into an anti-Semitic rage against the only ostensible Jew she knows who turns out not to be a real Jew. Alma is not really tattooed in an artful, positive, erotic, aesthethic way, but instead, is BRANDED by amateurish, home-made tattooes probably made by abusive men as she passed out into drug induced oblivion and could not defend herself. Her tattooes are not even identifiable as tattooes and many believe they are birthmarks. Her defenselessness becomes her downfall. Joshua Siegl is the son of a Jewish father and Presbyterian Mother and is baptized in the Presbyterian church. However, probably because of his wealth, the anti-Semetic attitude of Dmitri, a waiter who is well tipped by Joshua at a local cafe, is excreted from Dmitri's character into the blank slate of Alma's mind, which doesn't know how to think for it itself. What is even more scary is her irrational feelings of love to Dmitri who abuses her - but, I suppose this is part and parcel of the abused victim psyche. Dmitri takes the Tattooed Girl, Alma, off the street, from her runaway status, feeds her food, then feeds her drugs, then pimps her out yet she loves him so irrationally and despises Joshua Siegl equally irrationally who has only ever treated her kindly only because Dmitri despises Joshua. Then, it seems, Alma starts to feel beyond blind hate and comes to love Joshua as she then begins to despise and shun Dmitri who is merely using her as a cash cow. (Oprah theme: anti-heroine is smartening up). Just at the point of transformation in Alma's life, where this could be a formula Oprah book with the anti-heroine going on to a better life, Oates ends the story in a dramatic denouement. This book is not about plot and action and place as much as it is about the dark corners of the psyche. Characters are masterfully developed by Oates. The writing describes the inner minds of the characters interspersed with enough dialogue between the characters to keep the reader interested and advance the plot. The portrayal of Jet, Joshua's sister, a secondary character to the primary characters is masterful. Jet is portrayed as a mentally ill addict and the scene of Jet drunk and trying to play chess with her brilliant brother Joshua is finely crafted by Oates. Anyone who has been sober while watching a loved one get smashed and sick will appreciate the reality of this scene. A short novel compared to lets say "We Were the Mulvaneys", it is quite readable and concise although some of Alma's anti-semitic inner rants and rages were nearly repeated to the point of tedium. Fortunately, that theme turned and twisted at just the right moment to keep my interest. If you are a film aficionado familiar with the film noir genre, this book could be called "book noir" - Dark, pessimistic, uncomfortably real.
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