Rating: 
Summary: Flavor Flav urges you not to believe the hype...
Review: Okay, I resisted the superlatives for a full year before finally breaking down. I waited for the paperback to make its appearance because i am a man of limited means, and irascible to boot--not gladly hoodwinked or easily seperated from the contents of my front pocket. On second read, perhaps this all is slightly disingenuous. Truth is i am a fan of the beautiful and obscure, assuming, by some juvenile sort of calculus, that "financially successful" is in fact cultural shorthand for "bloated" and "irrelevant." This is my own personal yet unoriginal problem, i realize, and has nothing to do with Eggers. So please, forgive us our sins.To the point: this is not one novel but three. First and by far the most enjoyable is Eggers as neurotic, self-referential hack. Here I don't use "hack" pejoratively, in fact, hacks and sophists make for the best drinking buddies. Being obsessed with the arc of a phrase or the crease in your own pants might in the end be antisocial, but at least it makes for fun reading when the boss isn't looking. Second is the story of Eggers and his brother Toph, which seems heartfelt and is genuinely affecting. This is the part that most will latch on to, but you can't stop now, there are 400 pages to go. Third is Eggers as symbol of his generation: he attacks planet MTV yet cannot escape its orbit, plays the disaffection card yet is a model of hardwork and accomplishment, proclaims his freedom to leave the office on the slightest pretext yet bows to the 60 hour work week anyways. This is not analysis but summary. Knowingly, Eggers swims in this contradiction, chews it, spits out page after page of passing cultural minutia. The attempt would be worthwhile were the lifestyle he portrays not so famliar. Maybe it is my prejudice or humorless on display here, but the reader really does not need a lengthy treatise on the REAL WORLD: SAN FRANCISCO, no matter how sardonic or talented the author. Come on, I am twenty-three, i should be eating this up. To shut up now, buy this as a fun read and treat it with exactly 38% more seriousness than you would the latest John Grisham thriller. Yes, AHWOSG is better for you soul than that rot. But at the same time, Eggers will not walk on water, bleed from the palms or shake off the dust three days later. Now if only the critics would wait for a larger body of work before dousing him with such appelations. -thanks
Rating: 
Summary: Self absorbing boredom
Review: There are only a handful of books I have not finished after starting. This is one of them. The auther is extremely self absorbed, somehow thing that by merely growing up he is doing something phenomenal. I believe the phenomenal thing was that he got published. Save your money. Save your time.
Rating: 
Summary: Laughing out loud
Review: For the first time in a while I attracted some odd looks on the train as I actually laughed out loud while reading a book. Dave Eggers writes in a way that I think most Gen-X's will relate to. I don't really want to review the book - just recommend it. Reassure yourself that Bret Easton Ellis does not define our generation; that you are not on the verge of a nervous breakdown just because your mind is travelling in a different direction to your mouth. Just don't get any designs on Mr Eggers....he's mine...I saw him first...
Rating:
Summary: Dave Eggers: Editors Are Your Friends.
Review: OK, I'm a little late to the party. But the book is still being talked about so much that I have to add my two cents. Like many others (including everyone I know who tried), I couldn't get through this book. I wanted to! I was lulled by the positive buzz. I love a well-told tragedy. And I like to finish what I start, especially books. At around page 200, though, my mind glazed over. This book is way too self-indulgent, self-consciously clever, and repetitive. Eggers is extremely promising, but he needs to pare down the verbiage to win over this reader.
Rating:
Summary: intriguing initially....but ultimately boring
Review: I was initially taken by the unique writing style and brief glimpses of profound insight David Eggers brings to this book. But ultimately, I just stopped reading at about page 270. I had become so irritated with the delusions of grandeur and self-absorption presented here that my interest died. Full of gender bias, naked delusion and blatant age blindness (like...anyone over 30 is irrelevant to this guy's life). Obsessed with words beginning with 'f'. Silly stuff. Readers beware. Or maybe I'm just too old for this (sigh).
Rating:
Summary: Some Editing Required
Review: "A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius" presents a compelling story of a young man forced to be a parent at an early age. Dave Eggers shows great fluidity in his writing but the book could have been greatly improved with some editing. There are some lengthy, self-absorbed passages that go on and on and on and those passages tend to be the least interesting (Eggers writing about himself, instead of his brother). I was also disappointed that the young literati still have not given up the gimicky extraneous material and illustrations that Douglas Coupland used in "Generation X".
Rating:
Summary: MY BATH
Review: The most fun I had with this book was when I dropped it into the bath. Taking great pains to open each page without tearing was great fun. I am sure the book read well, being all about some bloke's life etc... But the impression i got was that this person had a vast supply of self regarding up his own bum claptrap to say.
Rating: 
Summary: A heartbreaking work of staggering genius
Review: Mixed and staggering reviews seems to be the norm for this convoluted-introspective autobiography. I have a hard time with it because I am past 18 years old--a lot past. It would probably appeal to people who have yet to experience much of life and find Egger's descriptions cool although "Catcher in the Rye" it's not. I thought of my 15 year old son in fact but I am not sure he'd capture the irony..so much for a dad's view. If you don't get around to reading it, don't fret. Eggers best days are probably ahead of him, one can hope. I look forward to his brother Toph's novel when he grows up.
Rating:
Summary: Honesty and Reality
Review: I'm not calling this book genius or staggering. And, frankly, I don't think the author would want me to. And that is what makes me appreciate this book for what it is. Just a regular guy, who had some bizarre and some really normal life experiences, telling us how it was in his own words. How could any reader not be interested in the details of the true life story of Dave Eggers? Other reviewers are getting tangled up in how he chose to write his story. Peel away the style and you've still got a very compelling storyline. A young man loses both parents (watching one of them slowly die), moves from one state to a very different one, raises a young brother mostly on his own, and then being in his early 20s, still has to grow up himself at the same time. The story alone is a major part of why this book is such a success. There have been entire books written on just one of those topics. This one weaves in a whole variety show. But then you look at how he tells the story, and, for me at least, that creative layer made this book even more original and thus enjoyable. Sure, it isn't a new idea to use other peoples' dialogue to reveal character. But Eggers keeps twisting that idea so that, just in case you were tired of his first person narrative, he can still tell you about himself and his experiences. Then you have to look at how this book effectively illustrates the time we live in. Using markers like The Real World, (and the accompanying love and hate of the show) or his experiences trying to run a hip magazine, the book really illustrates a certain segment of young America in the late 90s, early 00s. You may not like that segment of the population, but the book certainly helps you see behind it. As for the free-form, stream of consciousness, I have to admit, I skimmed a bit there. But I still appreciate how important it was to how Eggers told the story - the myriad of thoughts and ideas and mental flip flops any person goes through (especially someone with the life experience he had). All these overly serious reviews are getting past the basic point. This is a really honest autobiography (and, if the story is BS, then cheers to him for creating an interesting story nonetheless). You don't have to like the guy. In fact, it sounds like he might sometimes prefer it if you didn't. Eggers jokes about taking himself so seriously - look at the title, look at the great preface to the book. Me? I'd love to go have a beer with the guy.
Rating:
Summary: Inspiring and Funny
Review: Yes, thematicly and plot-wise it's a mess, but it's a beautiful mess. I laughed out loud, wiped tears from my eyes on the bus, and found truth on almost every page. The paperback version is worth owning just for the great Whale Story that is added in the new section. Not the greatest book in all of literature, but perfect in it's own imperfect way.
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