This had all the shortcomings of a first novel and, sadly, very little of what usually attracts me in a first novel. Compared to "Gun With Occasional Music" "The Intuitionist", "Less Than Zero" and other notables, I'm surprised it garnered all the positive attention that it did. Add in that it basically serves as the plot device for "Wonder Boys" I really am disappointed.

Not terrible but not really worth my time. ( )

this book reminded me of young summer in an unnamed east coast industrial town, smoking too many cigarettes, falling in embarrassing love and lust with inappropriate people, unsure where the train of my life is barreling.
but there was that whole "father is a gangster" thing, that kind of pulled me out of the fiction/reverie, in the way that i didn't really believe in it, but began, slowly, to accept it for the plot-driving device it is.
this book broke my heart, like long-ago people did. it made me yearn for it when it was no longer around. it made me ache, but in kind of a good way. ( )

Enjoyed this a lot...I dove in as i prefer, with basically zero knowledge of the book, topic, author, etc......i just started reading. Seems as if this was a rather insightful story of that first summer post college graduation.....that last gasp before officially starting adulthood. Arthur, with the grudging blessing (and money!) from his father, spends a final summer in Pittsburgh before figuring out what he wants to do. Lots of drinking, smoking cigarettes, new friends, lovers, experiences, family revelations, road trips, etc. Relationships thrive, they wallow, they fail......unexpected unions, attractions to uncomfortable situations, confronting his father and the reason behind his support......all told in a very relatable manner with honesty and humility. Some characters i really disliked...but that was likely the point.....and Arthur's willingness to step so far out of his box was unnerving now and then......but it still seemed believable to a point. Not bad for a first novel by Chabon. (My particular volume had Chabon's own thoughts on writing this, his first novel....and I really enjoyed that, as well!) Looking forward to his remaining works...most of which are already on my shelves. ( )

I'll be generous.

This book did not capture me. The writing felt amateur in ways that stunned me. I remember feeling lost in Kavalier and Clay, floating on wave after wave of blindingly gorgeous sentences, paragraphs, so complex and bold that you couldn't help but feel an awesome seasickness. Here, though, the writing is just plain old insecure. Chabon plays it like a coward, and Art sounds like a boring crybaby who we end up not liking that much because, well, he can't write fo shit.

Not that the characters were really that good, either. Art basically said that Phlox was fake, with her lack of humor and her pretend mannerisms and her constant attempts to change the way she presented herself to the world. What he neglected to tell us was that everyone else in the book was fake in their own special ways, too. And if not fake, then at least too much stock character and not enough larger-than-life-ness. I despised Cleveland and thought he was unlikable the way Hitler is unlikable. Art's father felt more like a set piece/deus ex machina than a person. And Arthur was just not really someone we got to deeply know, I feel, unless you count his homosexuality as profound facet #1 of his personality.

That's not to say that the writing was abysmal. It wasn't. It was bad for Michael Chabon, good when compared to other human beings. I was interested in Art's life, which is good. The last couple of pages were cool. Parallel to Gatsby tickled my heart a bit. I'm torn between 2 and 3, because I actually read this book with interest, even though I don't think it's great. "It was okay," I'd say, which is 2-star... and this is Michael Chabon, so comeonnnnnn. Yknow he could've done something better than this. ( )

Less absorbing than the other Chabon books I've read, but still an enjoyable read. Gatsby-ish. ( )