The Echo Maker
by Richard Powers
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Book Reviews of The Echo Maker
Book Review: So Disappointed
Summary: 2 Stars
Where to start? How in the wide world did this heap of literary confusion warrant a National Book Award? What could have been a compelling mystery-driven plot is soured by poor dialogue, cartoonish characters with unbelievable quirks and motivations, and a profusion of overwrought similes and metaphors. A description of approaching verbal conflict between lovers: "They'd get onto thin ice within minutes, then stay out there, spinning arm and arm, a whole pairs freedance routine." That's just bad. I kept with it, thinking that the payoff of the solved mystery would make it all worthwhile. It doesn't.Book Review: Power's best is unstoppable
Summary: 5 Stars
Richard Power's ninth novel is his best. Bettering his previous efforts, the prose is spare and precise, the plot compelling and the themes grand but accessible. The National Book Award winner - also short-listed for the Pulitzer - is an epic voyage and return tale, where every character, including the cranes that open the novel, go through a miraculous and unpredictable journey. The narrative opening - the brother nearly killed in a car accident who can't recognise his caring sister - is beautifully developed and unwinds in unexpected and profound directions. Unforgettable.
Book Review: Best novel I've read in a long time
Summary: 5 Stars
This was a fantastic book.
How do we make sense of our world? How do we connect the dots when we clearly don't have all the necessary information? What happens when that which is closest to us becomes completely strange? These are just a few of the profound questions Richard Powers grapples with in this excellent book. Amazingly, The Echo Maker reads like a thriller, and it contains beautiful passages written with such precision and depth of understanding. I couldn't put it down.
If you love an intellectual adventure, this is your book.
Book Review: Worst book I've read in a long time
Summary: 1 Stars
I purchased this book because I had read some great reviews. I was immensely disappointed and wish I hadn't wasted the time suffering though the book. The characters are dull and not very likeable. By the end I really didn't care to know what happened to any of them.
One thing in paticular that irked me was that the author attempts to allude to a mystery surrounding the circumstances of the accident. However, by the time the mystery is revealed the reader is no longer interested. Overall, a boring book and a waste of money.
Book Review: Good idea, poorly executed and very slow
Summary: 2 Stars
Reminded me of the Philipp Roth books I've tackled. Great reviews and covers smothered with high-octane accolades. But too clever for its own good and painfully slow.
There are beautifully written passages, and some clever thoughts put to paper. But the novel lacks pace, plot and as mentioned above character development.
Extemely disappointing. I persevered because I thought there was a good story in there trying to fight its way through the endless descriptive prose. My mistake.
Ho hum.