Richard Powers' The Echo Maker
This has been getting a lot of good reviews and critical acclaim, I guess, so I finally sat down and read it. The basic premise is that a young Nebraskan dude gets into a serious car accident, after which he believes that his sister is an imposter. A famous neurologist comes to examine him, and lots of examination of the self ensues. I mean, mostly this book worked for me--I really found the relationship between the brother and sister to be extremely compelling--but I really didn't like or care about the doctor's parts of things (his sections are pretty unbearable; who wants to read about a neurologist waxing on about the self, and his failing career, and his stupid middle-aged temptations, all from a totally self-aware doctor point of view? Besides Powers, I mean) or the parts that meditated poetically on birds. As a side note, I thought there were some echoes of Yehoshua' The Lover in the thought processes of the comatose brother as he awakens, but that could be entirely coincidental.
Verdict: a pretty good book, if you skim the self-indulgent doctor's whining.
have you read anything else by richard powers? i read "the gold bug variations," and it pretty much follows that same pattern, except substitute a whiny neurologist with a whiny geneticist. when i was a senior in college, richard powers came to speak, and he's an unfailingly friendly, intelligent man. i think his novels have great ideas (sort of a post-postmodern feel), but i don't think it's compelling writing.
ReplyDeletei totally replied to this earlier, but the internet ate it. anyway, my earlier response reflected shock that powers wrote two such crappy books, and wondered why such annoying authors get all the acclaim.
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