When I finished this book, I said, "Damn, this guy can write a novel!" Awful title, yes, but it's easy to get over once you start reading the book. Though this novel contains many of the same features as Morton's previous work, Starting Out in the Evening, what distinguishes it is that the identity and voice of each of the characters (a past-middle-age writer and his estranged family) are distinct from those in the previous book, making the world of this novel a completely different one from the earlier work. Their problems can't be neatly resolved and their flaws aren't necessarily endearing, but are real for this very reason. In fact, the writer character, Adam Weller, who is struggling to make a comeback, was a d*ck, yet unlike Philip Roth's perpetually d*ckish males, you knew Weller (and Morton) was aware he was an unlikeable figure confronting constant moral dilemmas and navigating a world around better people than he. This is a quality you simply don't get from a narcissist portrayed by Roth and it's something Morton is a hero for accomplishing. The relationships in this work include two individuals openly using each other for what the other can give them, two others who want to pick up where they left off three decades ago and make right lives gone somewhat astray, and two who are initially drawn on a purely sexual level but find themselves falling for each other on a much deeper level. Meanwhile, the issues confronted involve doing right by the dead, questioning whether another should have ever been born, being unable to counsel your own loved ones when you do so for a living, feeling frustration and impatience at someone you love for not doing as well as you wish they could, and finding meaning in life when so much seems out of one's control.Needless to say, I loved this book and treasured the experience of reading it. Below are quotes that I didn't always agree with but made me think: "Adam had taken the man's measure before he'd even at down. Jeffrey Lipkin was no different from the other supplicants Adam had met in the past few years. How familiar the type had become: all with the same tongue-tied eagerness, the same panicky need to please, the same vaguely homosexual huger for a mentor" (p. 26). [Thank goodness the writer in question proves to be a d*ck.]"She imagined herself writing novels, short stories, and books about psychology--not textbooks, but case studies, informed by a fiction writer's eye" (p. 45). [I had just the same dream in college.]"She was alone in life not because she didn't believe in true love, but because she did" (p. 49). [I wish this could console me for a dear friend's being alone.]"It's hard to comprehend that the dead don't care. We know it in our heads, but it's hard to feel the truth of it. Dead parents don't care whether we visit their graves; dead authors don't care about their reputations. Emily Dickinson died in the same condition as anyone else who writes for himself, any furtive unknown diarist. Herman Melville, at the end of his life, was just some local loser, not the awe-inspiring author of Moby Dick; neither of them was ever to know the dimensions of their future success. Yet there is something in us that makes us think of Dickinson and Melville as conscious somewhere, taking pleasure in their readership, glad to have at last been understood" (p. 101)."It would take so little, really, to play the role of a man's sexual-fantasy woman, since most men's fantasies were so crude" (p. 107). [How true.]"Most of my fellow inmates [in a psychiatric clinic:] think most of what they do and most of what they can't do can be explained by chemical i,balances. That seems to be the prevailing view. The professionals here seem to believe the same thing. But I'd prefer to think that there's something about me that can't be reduced to chemicals. Call it consciousness. Call it imagination. I'd prefer to think I can think my way out of this, whatever my brain chemistry might happen to be" (p. 332). [Antidepressants wouldn't hurt in nudging one's consciousness into finding value in life, though . . .]
What a disappointment.This was the first book in a long line of books that I couldn't put down. It started out so strong, and in spite of the author asking us to follow several characters very closely, I found it manageable, engaging, thought-provoking. Until...I was willing to overlook Morton's male fantasies (woman takes man by the pants, drops said pants and delivers blow job in wooded area of Central Park, and thus a thriving relationship is born!), because at times he offered what I consider some fairly accurate insight to the female mind as far as sex and power are concerned, but about halfway through the book, he really screwed up. I don't want to spoil anything here, but Morton's inclination to make heavy-handed plot the focal point of a novel that draws us in because of its complex, often-confused, and unfortunately unsympathetic characters created drama where we didn't need any more drama.In the end, I think he struggled to create any likable characters, his creations falling into predictable circumstances (middle-aged woman's husband leaves her for a younger woman because she's let herself go--really, is this the kind of scenario we're supposed to swallow comfortably?) and never redeeming themselves, unless you count the last couple of paragraphs, which, to me, were clearly tacked on without much profound thought.I still may read his other novels, novels which received far more laurels than this one. Morton can write, and it is a pleasure to have a page-turner in my hands. Next time, I'll hope for a more satisfying read.
Do You like book Breakable You (2006)?
Upscale Jewish NY family. Parents separated after 30+ years. He's a writer (and an unlovely person), she's a psychotherapist, about to get involved with a former sweetheart. Most of the story focuses on their daughter, and her love affair with (gasp!) an Arab-american, with a personal tragedy in his background. Uneven writing, none of it bad, some of it really good. (My favorite: a description of a bus kneeling like an elephant to take on a passenger.) Some good characterizations, and an interesting story, but somehow it doesn't come off.
—Leora
This book was well reviewed and I was looking forward to it. I was mostly disappointed. Despite the fact that a lot of the content is interesting to me (existential angst, psychotherapy, writing, love) it just somehow failed to come together. I felt the characters were all a bit too extreme in each of their own ways, and as if they were being forced upon me. I didn't really care about the characters--even though I thought they were fairly well developed. It seems that Morton is grappling with some sort of fine line between aging gracefully and falling into cynicism. I dont know much about this author, but "self-indulgent" or "self-analysis" came to mind. All that being said, I felt a sense of commitment to the story and was not able to put it back on my shelf before finishing it. I think it could be enjoyed for the plot and storyline, but not for the writing or enriching thought provocation.
—Allisun
I read this book a couple of years ago. I remember I thought it was ok. There was nothing outstanding about it. Just re read it for a group read. Now I remember why I thought it was meh. It is too soap operaish.Filled with over the edge emotions . I thought the characters were unbelievable at most and childishly developed at best. These people were suppose to be intelligent and viable characters, that I was suppose to believe. I think Ellie was a joke , this woman was a therapist,with no grasp of her field. Maud was her daughter and a student of philosophy. The only thing she knew was to question everyone else existence in reference to her well being as a person. Then there is Adam , scum of the low life of character's. A plagiarist of others works life and emotions. The man has no depth. A bottom feeder in the chain of existence. Maud's lover is a man closed off from the world and not living in it. Morton has no feel or development for any of the characters we are suppose to care about. That is why I could not buy into this book. This was the first book I had ever read of Morton's and I have not tried another. I don't want to spend money on another disappointment.
—Carol
