

Loading... The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao (2007)by Junot Díaz
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couldn't get into. ( ![]() Just a complete and utter mess I couldn't finish it. Don't bother yourself with trying Prosa fantástica, amena y contemporánea (al menos conmigo). Un placer de lectura. No aprendía tantos neologismos hermosos desde la naranja mecánica. Award winning, highly praised - so you get beautifully written tragedy and suffering. A lot of untranslated Spanish. Too much to figure out by the context with my non-existent Spanish. Since I was listening to it, it wasn't practical to stop and look things up. It is not only Oscar's life, it is his sister, mother, and grandfather. This novel has an energetic distinctive voice that propels you through both interesting characters such as Oscar Wao and his sister and the narrator and less compelling characters such as some of Oscar's extended family, all mixed up with a healthy dose of comic book/fantasy geek lore and Dominican political history. The plot is loose and shaggy and the sprinkling of magical realism elements unfortunate, but Diaz's unique Dominican-American voice kept me involved.
Díaz’s novel also has a wild, capacious spirit, making it feel much larger than it is. Within its relatively compact span, “The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao” contains an unruly multitude of styles and genres. The tale of Oscar’s coming-of-age is in some ways the book’s thinnest layer, a young-adult melodrama draped over a multigenerational immigrant family chronicle that dabbles in tropical magic realism, punk-rock feminism, hip-hop machismo, post-postmodern pyrotechnics and enough polymorphous multiculturalism to fill up an Introduction to Cultural Studies syllabus. It is Mr. Díaz’s achievement in this galvanic novel that he’s fashioned both a big picture window that opens out on the sorrows of Dominican history, and a small, intimate window that reveals one family’s life and loves. In doing so, he’s written a book that decisively establishes him as one of contemporary fiction’s most distinctive and irresistible new voices. Belongs to Publisher Seriesİthaki Modern (18) Is contained inHas as a student's study guide
Publisher description: Things have never been easy for Oscar, a sweet but disastrously overweight, lovesick Dominican ghetto nerd. From his home in New Jersey, where he lives with his old-world mother and rebellious sister, Oscar dreams of becoming the Dominican J. R. R. Tolkien and, most of all, of finding love. But he may never get what he wants, thanks to the Fukœ-the curse that has haunted the Oscar's family for generations, dooming them to prison, torture, tragic accidents, and, above all, ill-starred love. Oscar, still waiting for his first kiss, is just its most recent victim. No library descriptions found. |
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![]() GenresMelvil Decimal System (DDC)813.54 — Literature English (North America) American fiction 20th Century 1945-1999LC ClassificationRatingAverage:![]()
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