A dull, eventless book about annoying unsuccessful 30 year olds who sit around complaining about their shallow lives. I can see this appealing to fans of the "literary fiction" genre, but I just found it irritating. ( )

Set in New York in 2001, this novel chronicles the yearnings and failings of three friends, Danielle (perhaps our main protaganist), her best friend Marina, and their gay friend, Julius. Along the way, Claire Messud instructs us very skillfully about love and loss, about idealism and disillusion, honesty and hypocrisy.

An innocent would-be disciple moves to New York and secures a position with his hero. He finds himself disillusioned in due course (where a more worldly apprentice might not), and writes a hatchet-piece in all starry-eyed honesty. Predictably, the hero banishes the youth from his employ, who moves to a Brooklyn hovel and is perhaps lost when the twin towers are hit on September 11. Whither truth? Whither idealism?

Ms. Messud is particularly strong when reflecting the thought processes of her characters. Emotional forces running through friends and family ring true; I was never confused over motivation, nor by emotional cause and effect. The prose is graceful and fluid, touched perfectly by idiom. This is a writer who knows her milieu and puts you square in the middle of it. She's very effective.

Character, plot, style, and theme meld ineffably here. Most definitely worth your while. ( )

When I heard Maureen Corrigan review Claire Messud's work on NPR, I wanted to be sure to read and finish this book by the anniversary of 9/11. I did so just an hour ago, and still have my breath taken away by her astonishingly masterful rendition of characters, with complex interior lives, leading up to and shortly following that day. Marina, Danielle, and Julius are the thirty-year-old friends around whom we are led to believe the book focuses. However, this is young Frederick "Bootie" Tubb's story through and through, as we gradually learn the roles those three friends, as well as all others in the book, have in shaping his inexorable development as Messud's protagonist. At times the writing - filled with more interior rather than overt dialogue - can be challenging. But if one rereads such passages, it's clear they could not have been written otherwise. There will surely be comparisons to Bonfire of the Vanities, The Corrections, and perhaps Between Two Rivers (deserving of a much wider audience than it's had) - but as a literary memorial to New York and its culture before 9/11, and as a work of breathtaking truth about human relationships, The Emperor's Children is in a class of its own. ( )

I really liked this one. Even though it wasn't funny or weird. ( )

At first, sentence structure unusual. Great vocabulary book Story about 30 something and their relationship. How life is a contradiction. Father famous and is he worthy of worship. Slow moving at first, but well done. Brings up a lot of discussion issues ( )