A Visit from the Goon Squad

by Jennifer Egan

NATIONAL BESTSELLER • NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE WINNER • With music pulsing on every page, this startling, exhilarating novel of self-destruction and redemption “features characters about whom you come to care deeply as you watch them doing things they shouldn't, acting gloriously, infuriatingly human” (The Chicago Tribune).

One of the New York Times’s 100 Best Books of the 21st Century • One of The Atlantic’s Great American Novels of the Past 100 Years

Bennie is an aging former punk rocker and record executive. Sasha is the passionate, troubled young woman he employs. Here Jennifer Egan brilliantly reveals their pasts, along with the inner lives of a host of other characters whose paths intersect with theirs. 

“Pitch perfect.... Darkly, rippingly funny.... Egan possesses a satirist’s eye and a romance novelist’s heart.” —The New York Times Book Review

• ISBN10: 0307592839
• ISBN13: 9780307592835
• Publish Date: 8 June 2010 (first published 1 January 2010)
• Publish Status: Active
• Publish Country: US
• Publisher: Random House USA Inc
• Imprint: Random House Inc
• Format: Hardcover (Deckle Edge)
• Pages: 288
• Language: English
• URL: https://penguinrandomhouse.com/books/isbn/9780307592835

Reviews

[Jyc]

★★★★ // a lovely piece on the inevitability of aging, growing old alone, and just this overall cloud of sadness that hovers over you each passing day.

[Terri M. LeBlanc]

This is quite a curious novel. It is really more a series of short stories connecteed by one or two characters--like looking through an old photo album and remembering the stories behind the pictures. That being said I really did enjoy the book except for the chapters that involved Rhea and Lou. Because of their somewhat loose connection with Bennie and the odd point of view in which these chapters were written, these chapters were my least favorite.

[Michael @ Knowledge Lost]

A Visit from the Goon Squad is really unique and well written, but it left me without any form of closure. This is a collection of short stories rather than a novel; telling individual memories from people (and family) involved in a record label that is struggling to remain in touch with the digital age. The people in the book include musicians, producers, assistants, executives and publicists; but all their memories doesn’t really quiet make a complete story, there is too many holes and information missing. It does feel a collection of short stories from the good old days that have been pieced together to try and understand what it was like. While I enjoyed the stories and the way the book was writing (including a whole perspective done in PowerPoint) I wanted more and expected more from this Pulitzer Prize winning novel.

[lisacee]

Wow! I loved this book so much.

You know those books where the author tries to weave multiple characters together but you have to struggle to remember how all of them are connected? This is not that book. The many characters, with a center of Bennie the music exec and Sasha his assistant, live throughout decades during this book but it all flows seamlessly.

This book manages to jump between characters and years without confusing the audience or feeling forced. I feel like I know all of the characters and I loved watching them progress through their connected lives. I know this will be a book I will return to, just to spend time with these characters again.

The storytelling style varies from normal (though beautiful) prose, to a magazine article written from jail, to a PowerPoint slide show. Again, seamlessly.

I don't want to give too much away because it was so much fun experiencing it and I don't want to ruin that for anyone reading this. This is the best book I have read in a really long time, and I have enjoyed a lot of good books recently. Wow! I loved this book so much.

You know those books where the author tries to weave multiple characters together but you have to struggle to remember how all of them are connected? This is not that book. The many characters, with a center of Bennie the music exec and Sasha his assistant, live throughout decades during this book but it all flows seamlessly.

This book manages to jump between characters and years without confusing the audience or feeling forced. I feel like I know all of the characters and I loved watching them progress through their connected lives. I know this will be a book I will return to, just to spend time with these characters again.

The storytelling style varies from normal (though beautiful) prose, to a magazine article written from jail, to a PowerPoint slide show. Again, seamlessly.

I don't want to give too much away because it was so much fun experiencing it and I don't want to ruin that for anyone reading this. This is the best book I have read in a really long time, and I have enjoyed a lot of good books recently.