The Virgin Suicides

The Virgin Suicides, by Jeffrey Eugenides

I read Middlesex. I didn't like it. Even so, I thought I would try this book by the same author. It was first published in 1993, and although I don't remember hearing much about it then, the blurb on the back got my attention. This book is about the five Lisbon sisters, who all commit suicide over one year.

The premise was interesting, but the book was, sadly, not. I found it long, boring, and often confusing. The narrator is, one presumes, one of the neighborhood boys who was infatuated with the Lisbon girls. Now he is grown, and looking back at that year and the actions of his friends, the Lisbons, and their neighbors. He also occasionally refers to exhibit #s for mementos the boys collected of the girls, and of interviews collected of other people who knew the girls. There are no exhibits. You never learn who the narrator is.

Apparently, I am one of the only people who did not fall in love with this book. Newsweek, the NY Times, Esquire -- they all loved it. I guess I am not cut out to be a "real" literary critic. And that's OK, because if being a "real" critic means liking books like this one, I'll be an armchair critic any day!

©1993, Picador
ISBN 978-0-312-42881-5