Group Read, November 2017: City of God

Our group read for November is City of God by E.L.Doctorow. Please join the group read and post any comments on this thread.

I've made a start on this and it is far from a straight-forward narrative. At this stage (40 pages in) there has only been one bit of standard dialogue, the rest being short essays to do with religion, the universe and various bits of narrative without much context yet. There is also four pages that seems to be a deconstruction of the song "Me and my Shadow".

I'm assuming/hoping that it will be one of those books where it all comes together with the benefit of hindsight. I see "LibraryThing Recommendations" has Don DeLillo's Underworld listed as a similar book, and that is a book that took a while to pull apparently unrelated threads together in to a bigger theme.

I'm finding the same thing as puckers. There are at least 3 separate narratives, one having to do with a theft from a New York City church, one having to do with a Jewish man's experience in a ghetto during WWII and one involving Einstein. I just finished reading a section that contained a sentence that was well over 100 words long having to do with the early Christian church. This is not a book I can pick up and read anywhere so on my bus ride downtown I took my knitting today.

But I have read and enjoyed Doctorow's books previously and the fact that I could spell out what the different narrative threads are signals hope that it will come together for me eventually.

>3 gypsysmom: I am now about 70 pages from finishing and the stories are coming together. There are still chunks that I find distracting - the "deconstructed song" passages, and the "Gods place in a scientific universe" sections, but the story has added an extra half star or so as it has progressed. Like you I've enjoyed Doctorow's other works, and I'm hoping for a big "Ah!" moment before the end....

Finished the book and failed to have the "Ah!" moment. I get the overall theme (God's place in the 20th/21st century experience), but for me the interesting story lines were dropped and the book ended on an unconvincing/dull note. 2.5/5

>5 puckers: Ohh, that's disappointing. I'm a little past halfway through. Unlike you I kind of am enjoying the deconstructed songs although I have to read them a few times.

I started the book yesterday and have read about 40 pages. The small chapters was a bit confusing at first, but I am enjoying the writing and the characters so far.