The novelist ventures into nonfiction territory with this collection of essays about various aspects of popular culture and his own childhood.
Critic Reviews
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Outstanding
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New York Observer Tom Shone
This is a gem of a book. I can't think of another that captures so well the livid warmth -- later curdling into embarrassment -- that characterizes the jejune, impassioned and borderline-pretentious tastes with which we first find, and then lose, ourselves. [21 Mar 2005, p.7]
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Favorable
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San Francisco Chronicle Adam Baer
These are the highest form of personal culture essays: They explain what the subject means to the writer and then, through the use of story, they chart how that meaning became a strand in the dirty rubber-band ball he calls his self.
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Favorable
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The Globe And Mail [Toronto] Zsuzsi Gartner
A collection that will be more appreciated by committed Lethem fans than by the casual sidetracked reader. [9 Apr 2005, p.D14]
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Favorable
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The Onion A.V. Club Keith Phipps
The best essays in The Disappointment Artist, however, erase boundaries separating the personal world from the world at large.
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Favorable
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Booklist Donna Seaman
Lethem succeeds in granting readers insights not only into his passions but also into their own. [1 Feb 2005, p.930]
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Favorable
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Kirkus Reviews
Persistent and persuasive, like listening to that friend with the smartest take on just about any subject under the sun. [15 Dec 2004, p.1185]
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Favorable
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Publishers Weekly
Starts with an intriguing, if emotionally distant, consideration of his lifelong relationship with popular culture and develops into a moving memoir that transcends those references altogether. [13 Dec 2004, p.53]
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Favorable
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Boston Globe Amanda Heller
With surprisingly little sentimentality or self-flattery he tells us, essentially: Here are the seeds. See how they grew.
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Favorable
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Entertainment Weekly Gilbert Cruz
Lethem's trademark pop insight makes this slim volume a remarkable read.
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Favorable
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Los Angeles Times Marc Weingarten
By conflating rich critical insight with moving emotional subtext, Jonathan Lethem has produced a disarming treatise on the essential connectivity between life and art. [15 Mar 2005, p.E7]
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Favorable
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The Observer Sean O'Hagan
An odd little book.
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Favorable
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TLS: The Times Literary Supplement Henry Hitchings
The Disappointment Artist, while an unabashedly quirky book, succeeds on several fronts. Jonathan Lethem offers a probing critique of art forms and artists that are frequently underestimated, narrates his own creative genesis, and writes poignantly about the way we engage with our idols.
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Mixed
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The Observer Steven Poole
Some of the writing is gimmicky... But Lethem, as readers of his novels will know, certainly has style.
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