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The Virgin Suicides
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The Virgin Suicides Customer Reviews
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♥♥♥♥♥ |
Death in Suburbia
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With "Suicides" (implying more than one) in the title, talented author Jeffrey Eugenides' debut "The Virgin Suicides" promises to be somewhat depressing, and it delivers. Plot becomes unimportant as the only mystery is just how many of the five daughters in a suburban Michigan family of the 1970s will kill themselves and how. Suicide number one by the youngest happens in somewhat spectacular fashion. The rest of the novel is given over to a third person description of how the family handles the tragedy as told by someone (an unnamed neighborhood teenage boy) who can only infer much of the action through closed drapes, rarely opened doors, and a collection of objects that is eerily archaeological--artifacts of a culture that has died right before his eyes.
All of this can be a bit confusing and a lot depressing to the reader, but I expect that such a reaction is exactly Eugenides' point--sharing the outsiders' view of what has to be an intensely personal tragedy for any family. Then again, perhaps the suicides and parallel ongoing extinction of elm trees by Dutch Elm disease are metaphors for the death of the American suburban soul.
For me, "The Virgin Suicides" was better in the analysis (four stars) than in the reading (three stars), during which it reminded me greatly of another depressing, but well-written tale of suburban life, Rick Moody's [[ASIN:B000JBY0O2 The Ice Storm: A Novel]]. I'll round up to four stars. Readers would be better served to start with Eugenides' amazing 2002 offering [[ASIN:0312427735 Middlesex: A Novel (Oprah's Book Club)]], a definite five-star book all the way. |
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