Barbara the book grouch (The Middlesteins) followed by falling in book love again (Cloud Atlas)

 End of September Sunday Salon (Sunday Salon is a Facebook group for book bloggers)

I am Barbara, the book grouch.  The parade rainer. I have just read another book I know others will like, maybe even love, and I don’t. I would have tossed it except it is an advance copy kindly lent to me by a librarian friend.

The Middlesteins is a middle-brow sitcom about middle class Jews in middle America (suburban Chicago).  Both the book and the family revolve around Edie and Edie revolves around food and fat. 

            So much so Edie’s family fears that she’s eating herself to death. Edie learned this behavior as a spoiled, pudgy toddler – who always wanted to be carried. Now an obese grandmother, she spends her time cruising the fast food chains where she doesn’t even have to leave her car to eat. To underscore all this her life events-- and the chapter headings – are often marked/ labeled in pounds.

Those within her universe include her not-so-devoted husband, Richard. He’s had enough of Edie and leaves her sending the rest of the family spinning into panic as they pick up responsibility while he begins dating again.

No one’s very good at dealing with Edie and they all have lives and issues of their own. Daughter Robin is also dating and drinks too much and son Benny smokes pot every night and has a wife who directs his life. That’s  Rachelle, part princess, part perfectionist,  she tries to solve Edie’s problem with a plan.  She becomes the food police patrolling Edie’s habits and enforcing good food on her two twins, Emily and Josh, who are busy preparing for their b’nai mitzvah.

            To complete the characters in this universe add a bunch of relatively indistinct friends, so indistinct they even narrate a chapter in first person plural (how cloyingly clever.)  And finally mid way through the book we get  some Chinese food to spice it up – as well as the waitress and her father, the owner and chef at Edie’s new favorite place to eat.

            I fought the book until nearly the last page tackling page after page with groans and thoughts such as: some will call this timely; I call it a tedious. I get that it’s about the decaying middle class and an American landscape overtaken by strip malls and fast food, but even that could be interesting. Description: bland; insights shallow i.e.:  a character understands why Edie eats: “Because food is a wonderful place to hide.”

The writing is about as tired and unappetizing as a day-old Happy meal.

Some will find this funny.  I find it flat. At one point a character “tries to muster up a joke about Jews and food. Jews and funerals, Jew and Jews, but nothing was funny.” That about sums up the book for me.

 I don’t like being a book grouch. Sometimes I think I’m just in a bad mood.  Particularly when I read the glowing cover blurbs:"A truly original American novel, at once topical and universally timeless. 
Or: "This Smorgasbord of a book about food, family, love, sex, and loss is like the Jewish The Corrections, yet menchier and with a heart -- and it's hilarious. "I admire and read Jonathan Franzen's works even if I don't necessarily "like" them.

  Even  Franzen praised this book. He’s quoted on the advanced copy’s cover: “The Middlesteins” had me from its very first pages, but it wasn’t until it’s final pages that I fully appreciated the range of Attenberg’s sympathy and the artistry of her storytelling. (Barbara the book grouch also admits to finally softening towards the end and particularly on the final page, just not enough that she shifted her overall displeasure with what she considered the book’s artlessness.) The last book I read that annoyed me as much was also positively blurbed by Franzen. Guess I should learn:  Avoid books Franzen promotes.

            We have different tastes.

And then …..

I am walking on air. My head’s in the clouds.  I feel my heart beat. I have fallen in book love again.

With Cloud Atlas. With David Mitchell. With rich language. With layered interconnected stories.  With genius. I will blog about this book in the coming weeks.

        Where was I when this book came out? 2004. A year when I did not have the time to give this book the attention it needs. It’s not an easy read, but for me, it's full of rewards.  A long slow read, with lots of rereading.

Well, I may be late to the book party, but I’m just in time for the movie. Coming to Imax in late October. Tom Hanks. Halle Berry. Can’t wait.