The Goldfinch

[AnonYonimousBird]

I couldn't resist. June is too long to wait for the paperback. This should not be read on a Kindle, so....

.....my copy arrives tomorrow.

I liked it too. I have read a better one since then (Americanah).

Grief. I started this thread in October and I only started it today! So haven't read the thread for fear of spoilers....

Lady - I am listening to Americanah as my current audiobook! I absolutely love it. WOW.

Bumping this because I've finally, finally finished it - I kept stopping and starting, not because I didn't love it but because I just couldn't cope with it - the sadness, the sense of loss. The Vegas section in particular - it upset me enormously.

But yes, I thought of Theo all the time. And those places will stay with me - the brown dark warmth of Hobie's house/shop, the heat and bleakness of the desert, the hotel room in Amsterdam. I agree it will be a future classic - it's an astonishing book.

I want to say more, especially about Boris, but I'm wary of spoilers.

Loved bits of this but ultimately too self indulgent and too long. Really poor editing too. Clunky sentences and punctuation in parts but not surprising because nobody could commit to checking every word.

Loved Theo and Boris and loved large parts of it but every section needed to be cut. Even crawling through the museum was too long - I get it, he's dusty and disorientated. Ditto Las Vegas - I get it, it's rootless and lonely hence the intensity of friendship and drugs to fill the void. Emotionally it felt very truthful and it will stay with me but I ended up skim reading the last quarter. Will go and read the Myerson review now.

I loved it. Didn't really notice the length of it as was reading on kindle. I enjoyed it throughout and certainly wasn't getting bored or finding it a drag at all. Agree with pp that some of the gangster stuff was a bit but by the time you get to that part the book has already created such a big vivid world spanning so many different places and situations that I was happy to just go with it.

I enjoyed it, but honestly thought it was a bit of a hommage to Wasps and all their waspy glory. She's fascinated by them.

I finished it today. It has to be the best book I've read for years, so astoundingly well-written I was inwardly gasping at her capabilities (I'd never read her earlier books). I agree with others that the gangster segments weren't that engaging but what had gone before was so well-done it didn't make much difference, plus these parts of the book were integral to the general story, so for me it's not a criticism of the book.

A superb book that I'll be re-reading in the future.

Just what I thought, Southeastdweller

Reading this (slowly) atm so I'm not going to scroll through this thread as don't want to read any spoilers but - I keep imagining that Hobie should be played by Bob Hoskins or Robin Williams and then feeling all sad