Absurdistan

I finished this book only because I paid full price for it. It was not funny and the self-absorption of the main character, Misha, was tiresome to say the least. Repetitious sex, gluttonous eating and lame political satire do not make a funny book. I hated this book, and feel absurd for having read

"Absurdistan" is a very self-aware book. This hybrid of "A Confederacy of Dunces" and "Fight Club" the book is calculated and scathing in its language. With one swipe, Gary Shteyngart brings hipsters, academics, politicians, MBAs, history and consumerism to a palatable middle-brow level. Which is ju Leggi tutto

This disaster of a book is as senselessly profane as it is painful to read. While surely some measure of artistry was necessary to have stretched such an uninspired satire into 333-pages of filth, only a true dullard would find occasion to be impressed. Shteyngart's aptly titled story of Absurdistan Leggi tutto

Absurdistan is a few different novels at once. Along the way Gary Shteyngart uses sex, drugs, and violence to present constant dicotomies of pleasure and pain, and hope and despair. There are quite a few sex scenes that are kinky in a humorous and even strangely endearing way. And then there is sex

There's satire and then there's books in which everybody is horrible. "Absurdistan" is one of the latter, I think. It's about Misha, an emotionally crippled, morbidly obese Russian oligarch who wants only to move to New York to be with his girlfriend. He can't though, since his obese Russian oligarc Leggi tutto

This struggles only in how it starts and how it ends. Now I don't need a bow, ribbon, road signs, and a pat on the head when I read, but he soapboxed his way through this allegory, and it needed something firmer coming out the other side. It blurs at the edges and you're left nowhere when you spent

This is laugh-out-loud hilarious, by which I mean that it literally caused me to guffaw audibly in public. Second novels are often disappointing, but this one was insightful, incisive, and timely. Shteyngart skewers just about every ethnic group and political ideology in this whirlwind farce, and it Leggi tutto

If you were ever wondering what the difference was between a novel that is well written and a novel that is fun to read, you could begin your study with Gary Shteyngart's Absurdistan . (Or Heart of Darkness , for that matter.) Don't get me wrong, I can see what The New York Times is gushing about. Unfor Leggi tutto

When I began reading this book, I was very skeptical with regards to how much I was going to like it. But here I am, giving a four star rating, because this has been one of the most absurd, yet funny, rides I've been on in a long time. If anyone here read my review on "The Hundred Year Old Man Who C Leggi tutto

Good political and social satire makes you look at the world a little differently, with some laughs along the way. This did not. For the life of me, I can't figure out why this book got such critical acclaim. The humor was cheap and obvious (although sometimes actually funny) and I couldn't help fee Leggi tutto