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The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao-Junot Diaz
By Jenn · 7 posts · 29 views
By Jenn · 7 posts · 29 views
last updated Jul 21, 2010 07:35PM
The End of the Alphabet by C.S. Richardson
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By Lisa · 5 posts · 19 views
last updated Mar 03, 2010 04:48PM
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What book did you just start?
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What Members Thought
Its hard to briefly describe this book because Diaz has such an original voice. He tells the story of three generations of a Dominican immigrant family (but it mostly centers on the life of Oscar, an overweight, science-fiction/fantasy loving nerd) through a few different narrators. The footnotes and Spanish interspersed throughout the book drove me a little crazy but I think they contributed to the originality of the book and provided relevant Dominican history.
Another Pulitzer Prize winner that does not disappoint. I highly recommend this book on audio.
I knew that this book was about Oscar, an overweight, sci-fi, role playing geek, which didn't seem very interesting to me. Yet I quickly learned that the book isn't really so much about Oscar as it is about the people around him - his mother, his grandmother, his sister and his best friend in college, each of whom is such a fascinating character in their own right so that any one of them could have bee ...more
I knew that this book was about Oscar, an overweight, sci-fi, role playing geek, which didn't seem very interesting to me. Yet I quickly learned that the book isn't really so much about Oscar as it is about the people around him - his mother, his grandmother, his sister and his best friend in college, each of whom is such a fascinating character in their own right so that any one of them could have bee ...more
Feb 05, 2009
Bookmarks Magazine
added it
Reviewers agree that Junot D'az's first novel was well worth the 11-year wait. D'az established his reputation with Drown (1996), a collection of short stories that drew widespread praise. With The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, D'az has cemented his place in the literary stratosphere. He garners admiration for the "slangy and kinetic energy of his prose" (New York Times), as well as for the way he hop scotches between high- and lowbrow culture and ties together Dominican and American history
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The author won the Pulitzer in 2008 for this novel, his first BTW and I can certainly say it was well deserved. This was a fantastic read from beginning to end and I especially enjoyed the bits of history of the Dominican Republic added in as footnotes. I will definitely be on the look out for more from this very promising author!
At first, I had a hard time getting into the book, although I can't really say why. By the halfway point, I couldn't put it down. I was glad that my youngest son and husband had a boyscout meeting to attend last night because it gave me 1.5 hours of uninterrupted reading time.
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This story bounces across the pages. - A novel about the imigrant experience in America, mixing pop culture and politics.
I don't get it. I don't get it at all. This book was critically acclaimed? This book won a Pulitzer?!? I simply don't understand. Is it because of the dominican-american dude vernacular? The casual mixing of spanish with english, sans translation? The connecting of family members through their tragedies? Whatever it is about this book that makes people love it is completely lost on me. In my opinion, this book was way too long and excruciatingly boring. I didn't really connect with any of the ch
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Excellent, although exceedingly sad, immigrant family saga. At first I stumbled over the Spanglish, but quickly fell into the book rhythm & characters’ fuku. Yikes! The final pages, part III, is brilliant - so many threads pulled from throughout the book are pull taut.
This was a pretty amazing book. It's many stories within a story. Oscar is the main character - my heart went out to him as he spoke of many issues that followed him through his life... overweight, friendless, living in a sci-fi/comic book world. We hear from his sister Lola, his mother, his grandfather, his sister's friend "Yunior" (who appears to be the narrator of the novel). Diaz has lots of footnotes to explain the history/government of the Domincan Republic. It's a very gritty, blunt novel
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I couldn't get past the excessive use of foul language and racist words in the first few pages...
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Aug 23, 2008
Olympia
marked it as to-read
Dec 26, 2008
Chris
marked it as to-read
Apr 09, 2009
Paula
marked it as to-read
May 17, 2009
Laura Ellis
marked it as to-read
