Rating: 
Summary: A 375pg Rambling session
Review: Don't get me wrong, I like this book and all my sympathy goes out to him about his experiences... but for 375 pages, I was expecting a lot more. This book is more of a venting session, not the telling of a story, so if you feel like sitting in a psychiatrist's chair for a few hours...
Rating: 
Summary: Loved it -- for the most part, anyway...
Review: Although I totally see where some of the other reviewers are coming from (regarding Eggers' style or lack thereof), something about this book really kept me reading and thinking about it long after I was finished. I found parts of it extremely hirarious (laughed out loud!) and true to life and other parts heart-wrenching and full of despair. The run-on sentences, fragments, etc, didn't bother me because they were mirroring the author's life spiral. Even several weeks after reading the book, I find myself wondering how it's all going to turn out for Dave and his younger brother in the very, very end. In summary, I highly recommend this book although not for light reading. You must have patience and empathy and a sense of humor. Enjoy!
Rating: 
Summary: Would be a great short story
Review: The self-absorption and whining gets to be a bit too much nails on the chalk board. Glimmers of the author's genuine pain can be found throughout the book but nearly 400 pages is TOO much. The middle 200 pages in particular need massive editing/direction. It would be great if edited down to a short story.
Rating: 
Summary: Truth in Advertising
Review: This book was fantastic, amazing, incredible.... Beautifully written, honestly told, the writer creates his private world for us and invites us in to his "clubhouse," so to speak. As an older sister to someone 12 years younger, I especially appreciated his discussion of walking that fine line, between mentor, parental figure, and best friend.Whenever you think he might be too "gimicky," he starts to wonder the same thing--And openly ruminates with the reader that this might be the case. "If you can't hide it, shine a spotlight on it," I suppose. Anyway, when I finished this book I wanted to call Dave and Toph and have them over for their version of tacos. Great book. Buy it.
Rating:
Summary: Laughed until it hurt
Review: This is the most entertaining book I have read in a very long time. I found myself continually reading exerpts to my friends around me because I just had the urge to share the humor. It was the kind of book that I pick up to read for only a few minutes, but end up reading it the entire way through. This book revives the senses and reminds us that even in the most dire circumstances, there is something to laugh about.
Rating:
Summary: A Tour de Force from a Gifted Young Writer
Review: In "A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius" David Eggers exudes the confidence and free-spirit typical of a twenty-something, while at the same time conveying the sharp analytical insights and life-discoveries that are more likely to be imparted through the wisdom of an aged and experienced shaman. Eggers creates in his novel a self-contained literary universe that conveys the varied and complex emotions that stem from being a young, recently parentless, father-figure in the late twentieth century in America. In case we've lost sight of it, Eggers seems to be saying with the appropriate irony: quaint and curious life is! But life's strangeness, for all the pain it can and surely will cause, is also its most engaging quality in Eggers' world. In a recent radio interview Eggers claimed that he had little training in literary studies or reading the so-called great works, and one can believe it after reading his first novel. Eggers is refreshingly unfettered by literary convention. He is seemingly not even aware of it. This rarely comes off as a quality in a writer, and of course no skilled writer can escape convention, but it is a rare gift take ownership of the conventions that one uses. This is precisely what liberates this novel, what makes it striking and unusual. For all the cinematic shifts, emotional turns, and comic digressions of this novel, Eggers is always in complete control of what he says and how he says it. Eggers speaks what can only be interpreted as the truth by turning in his fingers the gem of his young life and examining all of its peculiar facets with a keen eye. His life story thus far is a rare gem indeed. But as strange and troubling as the events of his life are, they are not what hold the novel together and make it glimmer. What holds this book together is the remarkable gift Eggers has of making every facet seem strange and new. From the graphic descriptions of the complications of stomach cancer that lead to his mother's death; to the lyrical passages that vividly describe his (inflated) view of his own singing and athletic abilities; to his insights into his lack of parenting skills and those of his parents, Eggers never ceases to have something important to say. Remarkably, for all of its real-world importance, this novel never takes itself too seriously. There are no parables here. There is no rush to judgement on those that could so easily be damned; there is no moral to the story. With a flair that Whitman would be proud of, the story is all one needs to hear. In one seemingly highly symbolic string of scenes the protagonist attempts to finally lay his mother to rest, but folly abounds. Life gets in the way of a proper burial, or, in this case, scattering. All the while his mother chastises him from inside his head for what he's certain is a botched job. This is the story of a strange young life, closely and not-so-closely connected to other lives. Eggers constructs his life as it constructs him. We should all take note of the passing as well as David Eggers has. Let's hope he continues to challenge, inform, and entertain us for many years to come.
Rating:
Summary: Misnomer of a Title!
Review: This was the largest disappointment I have experienced since I learned as a child that there is a Shamu at every Sea World. I am a HUGE fan of McSweeney's where Egger's hangs his hat now and therefore believed wholeheartedly that his original prose would be just as stunning. Not so. Neither heartbreaking nor staggering and don't get me started on genius. This was, in the end, really just "A Work". The preface or "Part 1" was painfully funny and I had all the hope in the world that the treatment of his past would continue down the same path. Again, Not So. Alas, it has a pretty dust jacket and all my friends can borrow it now without dropping their own hard earned cash.
Rating:
Summary: Staggering Genius Is Damned Straight
Review: Even when the author of this book annoys me with his GenX-Youth-Is-The-Apex-Of-Everything voice, I am still astonished by the width and breadth of this book. The remembrances of his mother dying are truly heartbreaking. But also, as with the entire book, very funny. Though it is a lesser work, this book reminds me most of "A Confederacy of Dunces", in that the author keeps stuffing more and more straw into the mattress, well past the point when there's enough to sleep on. This is a true voice, telling a true story. I laugh, I cry, I want to throw the book across the room, but I read on. Bravo.
Rating:
Summary: Started out enthralled ...skim read the second half
Review: It starts out with such promise and such freshness that onealmost feels cheated by the lack of coherance and substance beyond thefirst hundred pages. It degenerates into a 'stream of consciousness' careless rant of unrelated and uninteresting events. I skim read the last 70 pages where as suspected ...nothing happened.
Rating:
Summary: IT'S ABOUT TIME!
Review: It's about time someone, an intelligent someone, can communicate honestly about how it feels to be abandoned and angry, particularly the sense of "being owed". And it's refreshing to note, through Eggers ecclectic writing style, that someone finally has the courage to admit that --even in our darkest hours -- we, as human beings think bizzare, sometimes inappropriate, and funny thoughts as we cope with the trauma at hand. I am so sick of "politically correct" and this book is the cure. Congratulations, Dave!
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