-
A Truely Brilliant Work
“This is an astounding book that showcases our futures individually and as a modern society. Houellebecq's insights into love, sex, loss and the future are scarry in their accuracy (particularly for a male of his age).
An amazon user wrote this on 2009-05-26.
Certainly this book will be offensive to many, but to those who read with an open mind the book is troubling and touching. This is one of the ten best novels I have ever read.” -
0 of 1 members found this review helpful.
Waste of time
“What a bad piece of literature. Several times I stopped reading this book, but then picked it up in the hopes that just maybe there will be some interesting development in the next chapter. However, that's not the case- it stays flat and boring the whole time. Let me summarize the plot so you don't have to waste your time: cynical man in mid-life crisis presents his views on life and sex. He comes across a new age group (based on the Raelians) and through inaction helps their founders. Every other chapter is a brief unemotional journal entry several centuries later briefly describing a dystopian Earth. That's it.”
An amazon user wrote this on 2009-03-15. -
0 of 4 members found this review helpful.
Yuck.
“I did not enjoy this book at all! It was VERY slow moving and full of remarks about people that I have never heard of. And while I'm sure it's no fault of the translator, it just didn't strike me as being all that well-written. It was boring and had a rather lame "futuristic" plot that didn't make too much sense. I really wouldn't read anything else by him or recommend this to anyone.”
An amazon user wrote this on 2009-01-21. -
2 of 2 members found this review helpful.
Not his best...
“If you are looking for another Elementary Particles, Platform or Whatever, you'll be satisfied with the first 75 pages of this story (I refer to the hardbound edition of this book). After that, Houellebecq loses his way and descends into gritty, untasteful pornography. While I liked the first 75 p., I also skipped the short, inbetween chapters, nonsensical sci-fiish chatter about the future or something. On pages 10-11, the author rages on in Fine Houellebecq fashion against middle class mediocrity; frequently sarcastically referring back to himself as "...a cutting observer of contemporary reality." You just know that the author isn't being merely fictive here-he is ridiculing his own reputation. He still gets in some good Arab and Jew digs here and there when one reads (again) on page 10. The reader suspects that underneath H's biting sarcasm is perhaps a bit of sadness? Page 17 yields yet more nuggets and then on the following page, ther hero of our novel accurately denounces Nabokov as a "clumsy imitator of Joyce...a collapsed pastry." Or maybe it's because Nabokov was the "first literary pornographer" who put Lolita into daily parlance...And I got my first Houellebecq anti-American sentiment on page 24 when he claims that "my colleagues...are much too preoccupied by the American press. We remain Europeans...our reference point is what happens in England." On page 38 our narrator rants that he was diagnosed to be a right-wing anarchist. Spain gets some good PR in this book; so does Teilhard de Chardin. H offers up a few astute observations on contemporary culture in the West (but just not enough!) The Spanish language gets a plusse with "A very beautiful and expressive language, naturally suited to poetry--you can rhyme almost everything." But then later down the page he insults my own (Slavic) peoples with "....from one of those absurd countries that emerged from the implosion of the Eastern bloc..." But after page 45, Island takes a dip. Our beloved author flounders around in even more distasteful pornographic images; hence, I did not waste my time finishing the book. But what a good first 75 pages.”
An amazon user wrote this on 2008-12-23. -
Insightful, entertaining, thought provoking
“This like Atomised is a touch misoginistic at times, however it gives a deep insight into the male psyche. It is witty, caustic and one of the better books i have read.”
An amazon user wrote this on 2008-10-19.
