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Adverbs: A Novel
Hello.
I am Daniel Handler, the author of this book. Did you know that authors often write the summaries that appear on their book's dust jacket? You might want to think about that the next time you read something like, "A dazzling page-turner, this novel shows an internationally acclaimed storyteller at the height of his astonishing powers."
Adverbs is a novel about love -- a bunch of different people, in and out of different kinds of love. At the start of the novel, Andrea is in love with David -- or maybe it's Joe -- who instead falls in love with Peter in a taxi. At the end of the novel, it's Joe who's in the taxi, falling in love with Andrea, although it might not be Andrea, or in any case it might not be the same Andrea, as Andrea is a very common name. So is Allison, who is married to Adrian in the middle of the novel, although in the middle of the ocean she considers a fling with Keith and also with Steve, whom she meets in an automobile, unless it's not the same Allison who meets the Snow Queen in a casino, or the same Steve who meets Eddie in the middle of the forest. . . .
It might sound confusing, but that's love, and as the author -- me -- says, "It is not the nouns. The miracle is the adverbs, the way things are done." This novel is about people trying to find love in the ways it is done before the volcano erupts and the miracle ends. Yes, there's a volcano in the novel. In my opinion a volcano automatically makes a story more interesting.
I am Daniel Handler, the author of this book. Did you know that authors often write the summaries that appear on their book's dust jacket? You might want to think about that the next time you read something like, "A dazzling page-turner, this novel shows an internationally acclaimed storyteller at the height of his astonishing powers."
Adverbs is a novel about love -- a bunch of different people, in and out of different kinds of love. At the start of the novel, Andrea is in love with David -- or maybe it's Joe -- who instead falls in love with Peter in a taxi. At the end of the novel, it's Joe who's in the taxi, falling in love with Andrea, although it might not be Andrea, or in any case it might not be the same Andrea, as Andrea is a very common name. So is Allison, who is married to Adrian in the middle of the novel, although in the middle of the ocean she considers a fling with Keith and also with Steve, whom she meets in an automobile, unless it's not the same Allison who meets the Snow Queen in a casino, or the same Steve who meets Eddie in the middle of the forest. . . .
It might sound confusing, but that's love, and as the author -- me -- says, "It is not the nouns. The miracle is the adverbs, the way things are done." This novel is about people trying to find love in the ways it is done before the volcano erupts and the miracle ends. Yes, there's a volcano in the novel. In my opinion a volcano automatically makes a story more interesting.
272 pages, Hardcover
First published April 1, 2006
252 people are currently reading
5294 people want to read
About the author
Daniel Handler
50 books3,095 followersDaniel Handler is the author of seven novels, including Why We Broke Up, We Are Pirates, All The Dirty Parts and, most recently, Bottle Grove.
As Lemony Snicket, he is responsible for numerous books for children, including the thirteen-volume A Series of Unfortunate Events, the four-volume All the Wrong Questions, and The Dark, which won the Charlotte Zolotow Award.
Mr. Snicket’s first book for readers of all ages, Poison for Breakfast, will be published by Liveright/W.W. Norton on August 31, 2021.
Handler has received commissions from the San Francisco Symphony, Berkeley Repertory Theater and the Royal Shakespeare Company, and has collaborated with artist Maira Kalman on a series of books for the Museum of Modern Art in New York, and with musicians Stephin Merritt (of the Magnetic Fields), Benjamin Gibbard (of Death Cab for Cutie), Colin Meloy (of the Decemberists) and Torquil Campbell (of Stars).
His books have sold more than 70 million copies and have been translated into 40 languages, and have been adapted for film, stage and television, including the recent adaptation of A Series of Unfortunate Events for which he was awarded both the Peabody and the Writers Guild of America awards.
He lives in San Francisco with the illustrator Lisa Brown, to whom he is married and with whom he has collaborated on several books and one son.
As Lemony Snicket, he is responsible for numerous books for children, including the thirteen-volume A Series of Unfortunate Events, the four-volume All the Wrong Questions, and The Dark, which won the Charlotte Zolotow Award.
Mr. Snicket’s first book for readers of all ages, Poison for Breakfast, will be published by Liveright/W.W. Norton on August 31, 2021.
Handler has received commissions from the San Francisco Symphony, Berkeley Repertory Theater and the Royal Shakespeare Company, and has collaborated with artist Maira Kalman on a series of books for the Museum of Modern Art in New York, and with musicians Stephin Merritt (of the Magnetic Fields), Benjamin Gibbard (of Death Cab for Cutie), Colin Meloy (of the Decemberists) and Torquil Campbell (of Stars).
His books have sold more than 70 million copies and have been translated into 40 languages, and have been adapted for film, stage and television, including the recent adaptation of A Series of Unfortunate Events for which he was awarded both the Peabody and the Writers Guild of America awards.
He lives in San Francisco with the illustrator Lisa Brown, to whom he is married and with whom he has collaborated on several books and one son.
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March 2, 2007
Jenna once gave me the idea of buying books from Borders and then returning them within 31 days after having read them.
The problems with that practice in my life are not ethical; they are practical:
1) I read in two- to three-months fury spurts, just like how I knit, except the reading trend is unrelated to avoiding other things in my life. Said fury spurts cannot be fabricated or induced, they just happen. I forget this, however, with great frequency, and buy fury spurts' worth of books sometimes without a fury spurt in sight.
2) I fold corners. If you know, you know.
3) Sometimes, at the end of a fury spurt, I get really ambitious and starting picking at the piles of New Yorkers all over my apartment. New Yorkers SUCK YOU IN and do not let you go until you are 13 pages into the article about the concrete industry in New York City and want to die and never read again. Behold: the end of the fury spurt.
4) Sometimes, to stave off the end of the fury spurt, I will try to "take a break," from such heavy heavy reading by listening to podcasts while commuting. Also sometimes, this happens because I can't always keep my eyes open on the bus, particularly when el Jeffo is on the bus and I need to pretend to not be there, or when it is very early in the morning AKA before 10 AM. This, ultimately, takes me away from the habit of the fury spurt and behold again: its end.
5) I am constantly overwhelmed by the volume of books in my apartment that I have not read or not finished. Sometimes this is so overwhelming that I stop reading.
Anyway, I bought Adverbs with the intention of running through it and returning it, but then I folded corners, slowed to a crawl, and realized a month had passed. That said, it was a good read: a little gimmicky but very earnest, if that is at all possible.
In case it wasn't abundantly clear: I should not write book reviews.
The problems with that practice in my life are not ethical; they are practical:
1) I read in two- to three-months fury spurts, just like how I knit, except the reading trend is unrelated to avoiding other things in my life. Said fury spurts cannot be fabricated or induced, they just happen. I forget this, however, with great frequency, and buy fury spurts' worth of books sometimes without a fury spurt in sight.
2) I fold corners. If you know, you know.
3) Sometimes, at the end of a fury spurt, I get really ambitious and starting picking at the piles of New Yorkers all over my apartment. New Yorkers SUCK YOU IN and do not let you go until you are 13 pages into the article about the concrete industry in New York City and want to die and never read again. Behold: the end of the fury spurt.
4) Sometimes, to stave off the end of the fury spurt, I will try to "take a break," from such heavy heavy reading by listening to podcasts while commuting. Also sometimes, this happens because I can't always keep my eyes open on the bus, particularly when el Jeffo is on the bus and I need to pretend to not be there, or when it is very early in the morning AKA before 10 AM. This, ultimately, takes me away from the habit of the fury spurt and behold again: its end.
5) I am constantly overwhelmed by the volume of books in my apartment that I have not read or not finished. Sometimes this is so overwhelming that I stop reading.
Anyway, I bought Adverbs with the intention of running through it and returning it, but then I folded corners, slowed to a crawl, and realized a month had passed. That said, it was a good read: a little gimmicky but very earnest, if that is at all possible.
In case it wasn't abundantly clear: I should not write book reviews.
January 22, 2015
Find all of my reviews at: http://52bookminimum.blogspot.com/
It’s time for my library’s annual Winter Reading Challenge. The challenge, should I choose to accept it (duh, of course I do), is to read five books between January 20th and March 20th. Once completed I can earn myself yet another bragalicious mug for my collection . . .
Oooops, wrong mug . . .
Easy peasy lemon squeazy, right? Well, the kicker this year is the theme is “Love on the Rocks.”
Romance is not my forté. The extra kick in the pants is out of the 25 suggested selections, I’ve already read 10. Although reading what the librarians suggest isn’t a requirement, I like to choose my 5 from their list whenever possible. That’s what led me to Adverbs. Uhhhhhh . . . .
Yeah. Daniel Handler might possibly be the biggest hit or miss author I’ve ever come across. Being a mom I loved the world that Lemony Snicket built, and as a grown-up I was floored by Handler’s ability to flip the switch and write something like The Basic Eight . . . But then I read Why We Broke Up and it was so “meh” that I didn’t quite know what to expect. Well, I should’ve expected zilch ‘cause this book was a real turd.
Handler describes Adverbs as a “novel about love – a bunch of different people in and out of different kinds of love.” What it really turned out to be was a series of unfortunate events (Ha! See what I did there?) – little vignettes that had characters, San Francisco, and yellow-billed magpies as repeating items that would tie them together. What it lacked? Any kind of depth or ability to entertain me. Wait, I take that back. The story “Clearly” was brilliant (but it was also creepy instead of “romantic,” so you should probably take that statement with a grain of salt). Sadly, one snippet of a whole book is not enough to bump my rating up to 2 Stars. The schizy, rambling style aside, when Handler opted to break the fourth wall at the 68% mark, I knew this book had officially jumped the shark. However, I don’t have the ability to “DNF” so I trudged through to the end, growing ever more bored and questioning how I could have ever enjoyed someone who wrote such pompous drivel. Let’s hope the next four books in the challenge aren’t lousy.
Alright, enough with the bad stuff. Now I’m going to bore you with the awesomeness that is my public library. First, I work two blocks away from it, so whenever I need to escape from my crappy job it’s super easy. And what an escape it is . . .
That’s just the parking garage. When you get inside it’s sooooooooo purrrrrrty . . .
With features like the old bank vault that has been turned into a “film vault” where movies are played . . . .
And the children’s library that literally has you stepping into a book . . .
Or the rooftop, where you can enjoy a game of chess Alice In Wonderland style . . .
I’m forever grateful to my beautiful library. It’s the only way I could ever be able to read 200+ books a year, so one stinker of a recommendation is easily forgiven : )
It’s time for my library’s annual Winter Reading Challenge. The challenge, should I choose to accept it (duh, of course I do), is to read five books between January 20th and March 20th. Once completed I can earn myself yet another bragalicious mug for my collection . . .
Oooops, wrong mug . . .
Easy peasy lemon squeazy, right? Well, the kicker this year is the theme is “Love on the Rocks.”
Romance is not my forté. The extra kick in the pants is out of the 25 suggested selections, I’ve already read 10. Although reading what the librarians suggest isn’t a requirement, I like to choose my 5 from their list whenever possible. That’s what led me to Adverbs. Uhhhhhh . . . .
Yeah. Daniel Handler might possibly be the biggest hit or miss author I’ve ever come across. Being a mom I loved the world that Lemony Snicket built, and as a grown-up I was floored by Handler’s ability to flip the switch and write something like The Basic Eight . . . But then I read Why We Broke Up and it was so “meh” that I didn’t quite know what to expect. Well, I should’ve expected zilch ‘cause this book was a real turd.
Handler describes Adverbs as a “novel about love – a bunch of different people in and out of different kinds of love.” What it really turned out to be was a series of unfortunate events (Ha! See what I did there?) – little vignettes that had characters, San Francisco, and yellow-billed magpies as repeating items that would tie them together. What it lacked? Any kind of depth or ability to entertain me. Wait, I take that back. The story “Clearly” was brilliant (but it was also creepy instead of “romantic,” so you should probably take that statement with a grain of salt). Sadly, one snippet of a whole book is not enough to bump my rating up to 2 Stars. The schizy, rambling style aside, when Handler opted to break the fourth wall at the 68% mark, I knew this book had officially jumped the shark. However, I don’t have the ability to “DNF” so I trudged through to the end, growing ever more bored and questioning how I could have ever enjoyed someone who wrote such pompous drivel. Let’s hope the next four books in the challenge aren’t lousy.
Alright, enough with the bad stuff. Now I’m going to bore you with the awesomeness that is my public library. First, I work two blocks away from it, so whenever I need to escape from my crappy job it’s super easy. And what an escape it is . . .
That’s just the parking garage. When you get inside it’s sooooooooo purrrrrrty . . .
With features like the old bank vault that has been turned into a “film vault” where movies are played . . . .
And the children’s library that literally has you stepping into a book . . .
Or the rooftop, where you can enjoy a game of chess Alice In Wonderland style . . .
I’m forever grateful to my beautiful library. It’s the only way I could ever be able to read 200+ books a year, so one stinker of a recommendation is easily forgiven : )
November 2, 2013
This is the kind of book that makes me want to go back and take all my 5-star ratings down to 4, so that giving this one 5 will mean more.
This is the kind of book where, all while I was reading it, I was thinking about how I would read it again, more slowly, more thoughtfully, with more intense concentration.
And so I did; I read it twice through, one after the other, and good fucking grief, it is so achingly good. The second time maybe a tiny little bit less so because I already knew so many of the good parts, but still, oh my god please read this book.
He does this stunning thing where all of the chapters / stories sort of have the same metaphors and themes, but they are very vague. Like in almost each story there's a someone dirty and sad, carrying their shoes, who will fall in love or be fallen in love with. And there's magpies and volcanoes and the Snow Queen and taxis and other amazing sort-of recurrences, or maybe more like fragmented repetitions, because each time it's a little different.
Anyway, although it's a novel, the chapters live on their own, and if I can't convince you to read the whole book, please please please will you just hurry up and read "Particularly," "Soundly," "Not Particularly," and "Often," because I think if you don't I will cry.
This is the kind of book where, all while I was reading it, I was thinking about how I would read it again, more slowly, more thoughtfully, with more intense concentration.
And so I did; I read it twice through, one after the other, and good fucking grief, it is so achingly good. The second time maybe a tiny little bit less so because I already knew so many of the good parts, but still, oh my god please read this book.
He does this stunning thing where all of the chapters / stories sort of have the same metaphors and themes, but they are very vague. Like in almost each story there's a someone dirty and sad, carrying their shoes, who will fall in love or be fallen in love with. And there's magpies and volcanoes and the Snow Queen and taxis and other amazing sort-of recurrences, or maybe more like fragmented repetitions, because each time it's a little different.
Anyway, although it's a novel, the chapters live on their own, and if I can't convince you to read the whole book, please please please will you just hurry up and read "Particularly," "Soundly," "Not Particularly," and "Often," because I think if you don't I will cry.
February 1, 2019
Perhaps you're a reader who'll have better luck.
In contrast to me, you won't find yourself stuck
When plotlines confuse you and run all amok,
And all you can think is to ask WTF??
Befuddled? Bemused? Yes I was, but I don’t feel embarrassed to say it. I’m pretty sure that was Handler’s intent. You see the verb to which each chapter-identifying adverb applies is “love.” How can any of us, the author included, generalize in any definitive way about that? I think it’s fair to say that there are as many facets to love as there are those who give and receive it. Maybe the point is to cover some of the different ways it can be amassed or abated, misconstrued or mishandled, and then to realize the impossibility of filling in every blank.
I’ve been told by the woman I love (completely and uncomplicatedly) that feelings resist analysis. She never lets me forget that math types are just hammers out to construe the whole world as nails. But what if the result of my analysis is that the book is intentionally defying analysis? Surely I’m allowed to be as meta-analytical as the book is metafictional. To elaborate, the chapters feature recurring themes, symbols, and characters, but the characters’ names seem to switch and recycle – it’s not always clear. Then about two-thirds of the way in, the “real” narrator (whoever that is) levels with us about the device and gives us some sort of map. But to me it was like seeing where Route 53 intersects Maple Avenue without knowing whether it was in Naperville or Natchez. Every little love story, as imperfect as the love was within it, would end essentially saying, “and that’s what love is.” The implied nod to the universal can’t be anything but ironic, though. The disparate and typically dysfunctional cases in point spoke more to the infinite variety of human relations. We’re not built to understand the immeasurable. How fitting, then, or so I suppose, that we’re not meant to make full sense of this book. I thought briefly of an interpretation tying in Kurt Gödel’s impossibility theorems, but I can imagine my wife saying I’ve gone too far down the math path already.
The more I read, and the more I saw the device for what it was (or at least thought it was), the more I liked it. The late appreciation then had me wanting to return to page one to see how it looped back on itself. Yes, it’s confusing, abstract, unreliable, and gimmicky, but it does make its points. As the recursively modified characters long to connect, only to see their romanticized ideals dissipate, it may help to remember some astute words from the book: “You can’t mind these things, you just can’t, for to dislike what makes a person human is to dislike all humans.”
It’s written well and gets at fundamental problems of how we relate, but it’s distracting at times trying to figure who’s who in these disjointed, often surreal stories. A closer reading may have made more patterns pop out, but it wasn’t clear to me that the pay-off would be worth the effort. I’m giving it 3.5 stars, then picking petals off a daisy to see how to round. I like it more, I like it less, I like it more, I like it less, …
October 16, 2011
Back Flips and Party Tricks
I hated the first chapter of this novel, so much so that it took almost 200 pages for me to recover and trust Daniel Handler.
Still, once it all started to come together, I did an amazing about face.
By the end, I loved “Adverbs” and felt sad that I had to leave this crazy assortment of characters behind (or was it them who left me behind?).
I didn't want the party to end.
Across the Great Divide
The first chapter concerns an unnamed apparently heterosexual male character who leaves his partner, Andrea, catches a cab and immediately falls in love with the homophobic male cab driver, Peter.
I couldn’t understand why Daniel Handler wanted to confront me with this character so early in the book, when we're just starting to get to know each other.
I mean, who would be so totally self-deluded as to think you could instantaneously fall in love with an unsuspecting character across both the sexuality divide and the passenger’s seat?
What prospects of success could this character (or indeed, this novel) have after an opening gambit like that?
At First Sight
Was Handler being homophobic?
I don’t think so. Certainly, there was no hint of homophobia in the rest of the book.
So it’s quite possible that he was just making the point that many of us can (or believe we can) fall in love this instantaneously (incidentally, the name of the chapter), that we can experience love at first sight.
Indeed, many of us sustain ourselves with the hope that one day it might happen to us, and that it will involve somersaults and other party, if not circus, tricks (even though, as Handler points out, there is no more impossible task than “falling in love in a nightclub”).
So this novel provided me with a valuable lesson in my ongoing literary sex education.
Don't hurry the author.
This early in a book, they might just be engaging in foreplay.
Give them time. They might grow on you. You might get in the mood. You might like it.
Sometimes, you can't judge a book by its lover.
To Boldly Go Where No Grammarian Has Gone Before
Another reason for my skepticism was the structure of the novel.
It consists of 17 chapters, each of which is headed by an adverb.
Most of us are taught to eschew adverbs in writing.
Here, Handler has won and asserted the freedom, not just to use them, but to bring them forward and upfront, if that’s not too adverbial.
In Which the Author Proceeds Listily...
My initial gripe was that they’re not a particularly inspiring choice of adverbs, at least superficially (which wasn't on the list).
I don’t think any (or many) of them would be on my (or perhaps even your) list of favourite adverbs on which to base a novel.
Here is Handler’s list:
"..., immediately, obviously, arguably, particularly, briefly, soundly, frigidly , collectively, symbolically , clearly, naturally , wrongly, truly , not particularly, often , barely, judgmentally , ..."
...When He Could Have Proceeded Lustily
Where are the adverbs you can get excited about, like these examples that I have chosen randomly (you might have ones that are better or otherly):
"..., suddenly, strangely, wonderfully, amusingly, tantalizingly, wholeheartedly, equally, madly, unconditionally, courageously, gently, secretively, quietly, noisily, gracefully, adoringly, pathetically, sweetly, heavenly, ..."
But then, these examples are probably just the adverbs that we have been counselled to eschew.
Something They Don't Teach You in Grammar School
So what did Daniel Handler have in mind?
Why did he choose such a neutral, neutered, sexless bunch of adverbs?
How did he plan to handle his subject matter?
How did he plan to seduce us with such words?
How did he plan to give us full body massages using these words as his hands?
How could he tickle our fancy using these words as feathers?
Impossible.
Or so I thought.
Love Traversed Adverbally
These words mean almost nothing by themselves.
Without more, they are just adverbs.
Handler’s trick is to recognise that his recipe required one more ingredient.
Step 2: Just add verbs.
Adverbs can't pleasure us alone.
They need a verb to qualify. They need a word they can relate to.
And the word is Love.
Love Probed Facetiously
Love is a diamond and each chapter explores a different facet through the eyes of different beholders.
There is some contention as to whether the book is really a novel or a collection of short stories.
However, the chapters are not discrete in the sense that they have no relation to each other.
Daniel Handler adds detail, chapter by chapter, so that meaning and understanding accumulate over the course of time, like a magpie assembles its nest, or photos add up to a photo album, or songs with similar themes add up to a concept album.
Characters, or at least names, from one chapter turn up in later chapters.
We learn new things on the way, constantly revising our opinions and speculating about the destiny of the characters.
So there is a cumulative wisdom at work, which unites the chapters into a novel of sorts.
Do You Believe in Miracles?
Everybody in the novel strives for love.
If we are lucky, love will touch and enliven us.
If we do nothing, we die.
It's a struggle of Sisyphusian proportions.
Life is short, time conspires against us.
We live on fault lines.
There are catastrophes occurring all around us.
We can also be distracted by petty troubles and worries, the detritus of past relationships that hang around to haunt us.
We are mad not to seek out and seize the opportunity for love while we can:
"What are we thinking? A volcano could destroy this town tomorrow, or guys with guns. Or both. Of course there’s going to be another catastrophe.”
The Magic Bus that Takes Me to You
The novel is not so much a hero’s journey, as a trip on a love bus, perhaps a shortbus.
Each member of the ensemble cast departs from their past, probes around while looking for love, and arrives at their own different version of the destination they aspire to.
Ultimately, with "Adverbs", Daniel Handler has lovingly crafted "A Series of Fortunate Events" for our delectation and inspiration.
Hitching a Ride with a Cab Driver
For each of us, there's a different way to find love.
And how we go about it can influence our prospects of success.
We must make choices on our journey:
"They say love’s like a bus, and if you wait long enough another one will come along, but not in this place where the buses are slow and most of the cute ones are gay.
"‘I could take the bus,’ Joe said out loud, ‘but a taxi is better...’”
So in the last chapter this particular Joe chooses a taxi to fast track him on the next phase of his journey, wishing and hoping the miracle of love will bless him:
"Love is a preference, and Joe found one as he was summoned to do.
"He found the love story he preferred, although he didn’t render this judgment officially until three years later when he and this cabdriver right here [Andrea] lay laughing and naked over how giddy he was during the miracle, during the blatant afternoon they met.”
I Never Metafiction I Didn’t Like
It would be remiss not to mention the sense of humour that winds through the novel.
At first, I thought I detected a cruelty, a sourness, a bitterness that seemed to be working on a sublemonal level, the occasional lemony snicker.
In retrospect, I think I was wrong.
I rushed to judgment, when I should have been patient.
The characters are diverse, but Daniel Handler loves them and their quest for love equally.
He likens love to diamonds and lovers to birds (specifically magpies) “looking for shiny things and carrying them around in their beaks”.
He deftly and humorously works real books about magpies [they are described as “attractive, artful and aggressive”] and a diamond ring [which is lost in his work and found in the other, real book] into his own work.
He locates his own bird tale in another bird's nest, he places his diamonds in another jeweller's setting.
He co-opts a whole world of fairy tales, fact and fiction into his own story.
In Which Our Lovers Arrive, Eventually...
Within his fictional ecosystem, “it is not the diamonds or the birds, the people or the potatoes [that are the miracles]; it is the adverbs, the way things are done. It is the way love gets done despite every catastrophe.”
Finding love is a miracle, the stuff of fairy tales, a legendary achievement, though not everybody experiences their own miracle:
"It can’t happen to everyone – as in life, some people will be killed off before they get something shiny, and some of them will screw it up and others will just end up with the wrong kind of bird – but some of them will arrive at love.
"Surely somebody will arrive, in a taxi perhaps, attractively, artfully, aggressively, or any other way it is done.”
And so it is that at the end of the book, Andrea takes Joe to his destination, stops the cab and announces, “You’ve arrived.”
He has come a long way for love.
...And the Reader Nods, Agreeably
The significance of the novel is not necessarily that they found love (the verbs), or that love happened to Andrea and Joe (the nouns), the significance is how it happened to them.
In Daniel Handler’s grammar of love, it’s the adverbs that make the difference.
He proved his point attractively, artfully, and aggressively.
By the end of the novel, I agreed with him.
Wholeheartedly.
I hated the first chapter of this novel, so much so that it took almost 200 pages for me to recover and trust Daniel Handler.
Still, once it all started to come together, I did an amazing about face.
By the end, I loved “Adverbs” and felt sad that I had to leave this crazy assortment of characters behind (or was it them who left me behind?).
I didn't want the party to end.
Across the Great Divide
The first chapter concerns an unnamed apparently heterosexual male character who leaves his partner, Andrea, catches a cab and immediately falls in love with the homophobic male cab driver, Peter.
I couldn’t understand why Daniel Handler wanted to confront me with this character so early in the book, when we're just starting to get to know each other.
I mean, who would be so totally self-deluded as to think you could instantaneously fall in love with an unsuspecting character across both the sexuality divide and the passenger’s seat?
What prospects of success could this character (or indeed, this novel) have after an opening gambit like that?
At First Sight
Was Handler being homophobic?
I don’t think so. Certainly, there was no hint of homophobia in the rest of the book.
So it’s quite possible that he was just making the point that many of us can (or believe we can) fall in love this instantaneously (incidentally, the name of the chapter), that we can experience love at first sight.
Indeed, many of us sustain ourselves with the hope that one day it might happen to us, and that it will involve somersaults and other party, if not circus, tricks (even though, as Handler points out, there is no more impossible task than “falling in love in a nightclub”).
So this novel provided me with a valuable lesson in my ongoing literary sex education.
Don't hurry the author.
This early in a book, they might just be engaging in foreplay.
Give them time. They might grow on you. You might get in the mood. You might like it.
Sometimes, you can't judge a book by its lover.
To Boldly Go Where No Grammarian Has Gone Before
Another reason for my skepticism was the structure of the novel.
It consists of 17 chapters, each of which is headed by an adverb.
Most of us are taught to eschew adverbs in writing.
Here, Handler has won and asserted the freedom, not just to use them, but to bring them forward and upfront, if that’s not too adverbial.
In Which the Author Proceeds Listily...
My initial gripe was that they’re not a particularly inspiring choice of adverbs, at least superficially (which wasn't on the list).
I don’t think any (or many) of them would be on my (or perhaps even your) list of favourite adverbs on which to base a novel.
Here is Handler’s list:
"..., immediately, obviously, arguably, particularly, briefly, soundly, frigidly , collectively, symbolically , clearly, naturally , wrongly, truly , not particularly, often , barely, judgmentally , ..."
...When He Could Have Proceeded Lustily
Where are the adverbs you can get excited about, like these examples that I have chosen randomly (you might have ones that are better or otherly):
"..., suddenly, strangely, wonderfully, amusingly, tantalizingly, wholeheartedly, equally, madly, unconditionally, courageously, gently, secretively, quietly, noisily, gracefully, adoringly, pathetically, sweetly, heavenly, ..."
But then, these examples are probably just the adverbs that we have been counselled to eschew.
Something They Don't Teach You in Grammar School
So what did Daniel Handler have in mind?
Why did he choose such a neutral, neutered, sexless bunch of adverbs?
How did he plan to handle his subject matter?
How did he plan to seduce us with such words?
How did he plan to give us full body massages using these words as his hands?
How could he tickle our fancy using these words as feathers?
Impossible.
Or so I thought.
Love Traversed Adverbally
These words mean almost nothing by themselves.
Without more, they are just adverbs.
Handler’s trick is to recognise that his recipe required one more ingredient.
Step 2: Just add verbs.
Adverbs can't pleasure us alone.
They need a verb to qualify. They need a word they can relate to.
And the word is Love.
Love Probed Facetiously
Love is a diamond and each chapter explores a different facet through the eyes of different beholders.
There is some contention as to whether the book is really a novel or a collection of short stories.
However, the chapters are not discrete in the sense that they have no relation to each other.
Daniel Handler adds detail, chapter by chapter, so that meaning and understanding accumulate over the course of time, like a magpie assembles its nest, or photos add up to a photo album, or songs with similar themes add up to a concept album.
Characters, or at least names, from one chapter turn up in later chapters.
We learn new things on the way, constantly revising our opinions and speculating about the destiny of the characters.
So there is a cumulative wisdom at work, which unites the chapters into a novel of sorts.
Do You Believe in Miracles?
Everybody in the novel strives for love.
If we are lucky, love will touch and enliven us.
If we do nothing, we die.
It's a struggle of Sisyphusian proportions.
Life is short, time conspires against us.
We live on fault lines.
There are catastrophes occurring all around us.
We can also be distracted by petty troubles and worries, the detritus of past relationships that hang around to haunt us.
We are mad not to seek out and seize the opportunity for love while we can:
"What are we thinking? A volcano could destroy this town tomorrow, or guys with guns. Or both. Of course there’s going to be another catastrophe.”
The Magic Bus that Takes Me to You
The novel is not so much a hero’s journey, as a trip on a love bus, perhaps a shortbus.
Each member of the ensemble cast departs from their past, probes around while looking for love, and arrives at their own different version of the destination they aspire to.
Ultimately, with "Adverbs", Daniel Handler has lovingly crafted "A Series of Fortunate Events" for our delectation and inspiration.
Hitching a Ride with a Cab Driver
For each of us, there's a different way to find love.
And how we go about it can influence our prospects of success.
We must make choices on our journey:
"They say love’s like a bus, and if you wait long enough another one will come along, but not in this place where the buses are slow and most of the cute ones are gay.
"‘I could take the bus,’ Joe said out loud, ‘but a taxi is better...’”
So in the last chapter this particular Joe chooses a taxi to fast track him on the next phase of his journey, wishing and hoping the miracle of love will bless him:
"Love is a preference, and Joe found one as he was summoned to do.
"He found the love story he preferred, although he didn’t render this judgment officially until three years later when he and this cabdriver right here [Andrea] lay laughing and naked over how giddy he was during the miracle, during the blatant afternoon they met.”
I Never Metafiction I Didn’t Like
It would be remiss not to mention the sense of humour that winds through the novel.
At first, I thought I detected a cruelty, a sourness, a bitterness that seemed to be working on a sublemonal level, the occasional lemony snicker.
In retrospect, I think I was wrong.
I rushed to judgment, when I should have been patient.
The characters are diverse, but Daniel Handler loves them and their quest for love equally.
He likens love to diamonds and lovers to birds (specifically magpies) “looking for shiny things and carrying them around in their beaks”.
He deftly and humorously works real books about magpies [they are described as “attractive, artful and aggressive”] and a diamond ring [which is lost in his work and found in the other, real book] into his own work.
He locates his own bird tale in another bird's nest, he places his diamonds in another jeweller's setting.
He co-opts a whole world of fairy tales, fact and fiction into his own story.
In Which Our Lovers Arrive, Eventually...
Within his fictional ecosystem, “it is not the diamonds or the birds, the people or the potatoes [that are the miracles]; it is the adverbs, the way things are done. It is the way love gets done despite every catastrophe.”
Finding love is a miracle, the stuff of fairy tales, a legendary achievement, though not everybody experiences their own miracle:
"It can’t happen to everyone – as in life, some people will be killed off before they get something shiny, and some of them will screw it up and others will just end up with the wrong kind of bird – but some of them will arrive at love.
"Surely somebody will arrive, in a taxi perhaps, attractively, artfully, aggressively, or any other way it is done.”
And so it is that at the end of the book, Andrea takes Joe to his destination, stops the cab and announces, “You’ve arrived.”
He has come a long way for love.
...And the Reader Nods, Agreeably
The significance of the novel is not necessarily that they found love (the verbs), or that love happened to Andrea and Joe (the nouns), the significance is how it happened to them.
In Daniel Handler’s grammar of love, it’s the adverbs that make the difference.
He proved his point attractively, artfully, and aggressively.
By the end of the novel, I agreed with him.
Wholeheartedly.
January 26, 2012
Three is too generous, because I'm mad - deeply mad - at you, Adverbs. You sucked away 17 days of my life for what? WHAT, I ask you? Some clever lines, repeating symbols, cutesy structure - but what the hell was this? A novel? (no) Short stories? (maybe) Intellectual masturbation, because Daniel Handler could? (probably)
By the end I was confused and annoyed, and now I'm reliving that confusion and annoyance. I confess, I've decided to abandon this one short story/chapter/ejaculation before the end, so if that last chapter is critical to the whole flippin' thing coming together marvellously, magically or miraculously, do let me know.
By the end I was confused and annoyed, and now I'm reliving that confusion and annoyance. I confess, I've decided to abandon this one short story/chapter/ejaculation before the end, so if that last chapter is critical to the whole flippin' thing coming together marvellously, magically or miraculously, do let me know.
July 27, 2009
As is the case with Barenaked Ladies fans and people that think Jay Leno is funny, those that like this book will be judged harshly and possibly abandoned.
March 2, 2007
This book looks, at first, to be a series of short stories that are titled with adverbs - Particularly, Often, etc. A cute concept that sparks some curiosity. But it really gets going when you realize that all the characters are connected, but the stories are not chronological nor are narrations always comprehensible. Sometimes Joe isn't Joe and Mike is called Mark but his name is something else, and there are 2 Andreas, or are there? A mental map is so not good enough. I would suggest writing down EVERY name you come across as soon as you begin,and then draw the connection lines. I really wish I had done that. The writing is interesting, especially when it's not straigtforward, and I often felt like the author was messing with our heads on purpose and getting a good laugh out of our attempts to decipher his intent. The stories in themselves are enjoyable and focus on emotions, life and death, love, optimism, pessimism, cynicism, etc. If you have to be on top of the plot all the time, then this book might not be for you - you just have to be able to accept that it is not possible to understand everything all the time. Maybe that's the whole point.
October 3, 2007
I've never read Handler's kid stuff but Adverbs did make me feel young again, if you don't mind that dust-smudged cliche. Not that I'm old even. And I certainly don't yearn for a lost childhood. Adverbs, the novel, or rather Adverbs: A Novel, made English over for me again, for the little while I was inside it. I had that giddy feeling I remember from my toddling times after reading my first "grown-ups" book -- that is, my first book without pictures. I don't know what that book was but it doesn't matter. It's the feeling that's important, that twang of wonder. And I have to say with some chagrin, because it makes me sound sentimental (or simply mental), but this book gave me the grins, like one of those drugs plucked from under forest ferns I haven't taken since high school. I felt like a fool while reading this book. The kind of fool that people point too and say: "That idiot must be the luckiest man alive."
April 6, 2011
Adverbs has a twisty, clever authorial voice, all-knowing and wise like the best omniscient narrators, which doesn’t really deviate from its essential Handlerness, despite inhabiting the emotional realm of his lovesick hipster personnel. But Handler handles words like a panhandler panhandles handles, or a handler handles hands: deftly, with aplomb.
Like Watch Your Mouth, Handler uses recurring images, phrases, motifs, characters, spooling them through his stylish prose with its sardonic Sorrentino metacomment, its wily Nabokovian impatience, its Eggersian whimsy. Each chapter corresponds to one particular adverb, but it’s irrelevant really, as the star here is the style, and the style succeeds strikingly well at depicting the yearnings and maimings of love. And they’re endlessly funny.
Like Watch Your Mouth, Handler uses recurring images, phrases, motifs, characters, spooling them through his stylish prose with its sardonic Sorrentino metacomment, its wily Nabokovian impatience, its Eggersian whimsy. Each chapter corresponds to one particular adverb, but it’s irrelevant really, as the star here is the style, and the style succeeds strikingly well at depicting the yearnings and maimings of love. And they’re endlessly funny.
December 7, 2007
David Handler is brilliant. This book compiles a bunch of stories involving characters who are intimately or barely connected to each other. Each chapter is a short story but the characters become so intertwined that it feels like a novel. The theme of this book? Love, love, and more love. But it aint what you think. This isn't a cheesy and cliche book about the heart to heart, folks. This is a book about every kind of love, from the obvious to the mysterious. I think that when I am done reading this book, I will read this book. Again. Lovingly, excitedly, and satisfyingly.
December 15, 2012
Can I give this less than one star? Adverbs? I have nouns: crap, nonsense, onanism. I have adjectives: rambling, tedious, juvenile. I have better things to do than waste time on this book and so do you.
March 27, 2017
Forget the adverbs, here's some adjectives that describe me after turning the last page.
Confused.
Bewildered.
Uncomprehending.
There's a part in the book that talks about how, when love goes wrong, you want all those hours back that you spent with the other person. I feel that way about this book, although I didn't really spend that many hours reading it.
I thought it was a novel, but it read like short stories because there's no plot. But the characters change in each story, and aren't identified at times. There may or may not be a volcano. I don't know. And I don't think it had very much to do with love.
Confused.
Bewildered.
Uncomprehending.
There's a part in the book that talks about how, when love goes wrong, you want all those hours back that you spent with the other person. I feel that way about this book, although I didn't really spend that many hours reading it.
I thought it was a novel, but it read like short stories because there's no plot. But the characters change in each story, and aren't identified at times. There may or may not be a volcano. I don't know. And I don't think it had very much to do with love.
June 21, 2012
What is love? The song suggests that ‘oh baby don’t hurt me’ so does that mean is love about pain? I think that this is probably not the impression you want to give… unless you are into that sort of thing, which most women 15-65 seem to be if this is so popular.
Love is…
Well, when I was young, I used to think that this represented love.
[image error]
I’m not sure that that is so healthy either, but I had a ton of them.. they were my ‘go to’ I guess…
When I google ‘Love is’ I get this comic strip… which I know that I’ve run into before but always brushed off for hokeyness. Now, are we so disillusioned by love that we need to reconstruct love into something like this?
Daniel Handler (a.k.a Lemony Snicket, but don’t think of him as Lemony when you read this because it will throw you off kilter) has written a love story. It has 17 parts to it all described with adverbs. You can love immediately, obviously, arguably, particularly, briefly, soundly, frigidly, collectively, symbolically, clearly, naturally, wrongly, truly, not particularly, often, barely and judgmentally. I could have done with maybe 13 or 14 but the reason this didn’t rate higher for me was that by 15 I was ready to be done with love. I didn’t care about love being often, bare or judgmental.
The stories seem like separate entities until you start to notice characters drifting in and out and then you try to place them in the timeline, which is also something I don’t recommend doing because it will give you a headache. Just go with it. Take the ranting, the stream of consciousness, half-truths, and off the wall declarations. Take them and digest them and maybe follow it up with a Tanqueray and tonic because after some of these, you may need it.
“They say when you’re really in love, the world becomes gossamer and gorgeous, but in my experience---the world gets grimy, and the love object is in stark relief from the surroundings. This is love, a pretty thing on an ugly street, and why wouldn’t you pick it up if it appeared in a cab?”
“A butter bird is, butter shaped into the shape of a decorative bird, but the point is, why is there cruelty? Why do people ask other people to do impossible things? Why behave this way? Why is there mean, when there are better things than mean, love particularly?”
“This is love, to sit with someone you’ve known forever in a place you’ve been meaning to go, and watching as their life happens to them until you stand up and it’s time to go. You don’t care about yours. Why should it change, the love you feel, no matter how death goes?”
“This is love, the plain truth once you get inside. Like a peacock, we all show off with the plumage. Come in and watch us make it! But then it’s just the same story, sugar and spice all spun up. We’re all mostly salt water. Love is candy from a stranger, but it’s candy you’ve had before and it probably won’t kill you.”
“Love is keeping that symbolic focus, each kiss crucial, each step a landmark. I could have read down a list of every important landmark in America and told you what they all stood for symbolically, what it meant if they were to be destroyed.”
“You love once and then maybe not again. Not on a day like this. The rain, the rain, the rain. You can’t even hear it outside the window but still it’s a sad thing. Rain, the grade school teachers say, makes the trees and flowers grow, but we’re not trees and flowers, and so many grade school teachers are single.”
So, this is love… and if I had to choose, I would say I like loving soundly, wrongly, and obviously best. And I love this.
Whoa whoa whoa, oooh oooh
Whoa whoa whoa, oooh oooh
Oh baby, don't hurt me
Don't hurt me no more (oooh, oooh)
December 9, 2025
I get why
I can see how this appealed to many people and I enjoy the Series of Unfortunate Events Series but the style and jumping around storytelling in this one wasn't for me.
It was jarring and wasn't a style I enjoy, still giving it a 3 as The story itself is pretty good.
I can see how this appealed to many people and I enjoy the Series of Unfortunate Events Series but the style and jumping around storytelling in this one wasn't for me.
It was jarring and wasn't a style I enjoy, still giving it a 3 as The story itself is pretty good.
March 6, 2014
Reading this book is like looking at things at the bottom of a swimming pool. You can't hear very much, or touch them without closing your eyes and holding your breath, and the outlines keep changing and at any rate you're never sure how far away they are, but they're pretty in a fascinating sort of a way. They keep changing, and you can't get a hand on what they actually are or they're meant to represent, so all you can do is look at the shapes and how they keep fluctuating and irregularly morphing in front of your eyes. You have to take them at face value and not fight to explain them in a sentence or follow the thread of them, because the thread is probably not there.
The adverbs of this book are ways that Daniel Handler thinks love happens. Daniel Handler has no idea how love happens, if this is anything to go by, but that's hardly the point. This book reminds me that sometimes I don't need to have as strong a hold on the world as I want to, that the way things are done is sometimes the important or beautiful thing, and that occasionally, when somebody tries to explain to you that love is a bit like saltwater taffy, it's okay to say No It's Bloody Not and keep enjoying it anyway.
The adverbs of this book are ways that Daniel Handler thinks love happens. Daniel Handler has no idea how love happens, if this is anything to go by, but that's hardly the point. This book reminds me that sometimes I don't need to have as strong a hold on the world as I want to, that the way things are done is sometimes the important or beautiful thing, and that occasionally, when somebody tries to explain to you that love is a bit like saltwater taffy, it's okay to say No It's Bloody Not and keep enjoying it anyway.
July 25, 2007
"This is a novel about love," says the back cover. Well, it's half right. It is about love, but calling it a novel is a bit of a stretch. The book has no central character or plot, just a series of stories, sometimes connected, about a bunch of different people who sometimes pop up in each others' stories. I think maybe someone might say that love is the main character, but having a main character who's schizophrenic and/or prone to wild mood swings is a difficult task to pull off without a plot as a guide, and so it fails in that respect. As a set of short stories, the constant attempts to link things together (by mentioning characters from the other stories) seems like kind of a halfassed sort of connection. Nevertheless, every once in a while, you'll stumble upon a sentence, or passage, or paragraph of startling beauty, grace, style, and humor, and that kind of makes up for the flaws, at least to some extent.
February 4, 2013
As if this book needed another review . . .
Thousands of readers apparently either love or hate this book or feel something in between too. Love is like this. Sometimes it feels a lot like hate or something in between, and that's OK.
Adverbs is a loosely knit chain of modifiers. Everything is so unrelated in its relatedness. And it's all about love . . . and people, people with similar names and a volcano or a man-made disaster, maybe. Some will see this absurd romp as the work of a genius; some will see it as the brilliant narrative meanderings of a loose-cannon writer. Yeah, and some will see it as tediously bothersome drivel. But why? Why not sit back and enjoy loose-cannon meandering romps? Loosen up. Why so tense? This is a very good question. I wildly found Adverbs wildly entertaining. I'm not sure I'd want to spend an evening with someone who didn't feel wildly about this book.
Adverbs is post-apocalyptic and volcanic (obviously) metafiction about LOVE. Daniel Handler, bless him to Mars and back, takes chances and why shouldn't he? He brings stream-of-consciousness prose to a post-Woolf generation. And that's sexy.
For all the romping hijinks and the meta-apocalyptic banter, Handler does come to conclusions about love. There are profound moments. There are also comic(book) moments. There are songs, there are Mikes and there are magpies. And, seriously, there are the most original and surprising similes. And seriously again: I LOVED this book.
Love,
Chris
Thousands of readers apparently either love or hate this book or feel something in between too. Love is like this. Sometimes it feels a lot like hate or something in between, and that's OK.
Adverbs is a loosely knit chain of modifiers. Everything is so unrelated in its relatedness. And it's all about love . . . and people, people with similar names and a volcano or a man-made disaster, maybe. Some will see this absurd romp as the work of a genius; some will see it as the brilliant narrative meanderings of a loose-cannon writer. Yeah, and some will see it as tediously bothersome drivel. But why? Why not sit back and enjoy loose-cannon meandering romps? Loosen up. Why so tense? This is a very good question. I wildly found Adverbs wildly entertaining. I'm not sure I'd want to spend an evening with someone who didn't feel wildly about this book.
Adverbs is post-apocalyptic and volcanic (obviously) metafiction about LOVE. Daniel Handler, bless him to Mars and back, takes chances and why shouldn't he? He brings stream-of-consciousness prose to a post-Woolf generation. And that's sexy.
For all the romping hijinks and the meta-apocalyptic banter, Handler does come to conclusions about love. There are profound moments. There are also comic(book) moments. There are songs, there are Mikes and there are magpies. And, seriously, there are the most original and surprising similes. And seriously again: I LOVED this book.
Love,
Chris
August 3, 2008
I hate adverbs, but there was something intriguing about this collection of stories written by the author of the Lemony Snicket books. Unfortunately, this is one of those books that aspires to be something more than it is. While I like the interconnectedness of the stories, I couldn't help feeling like I'd seen this trick somewhere before...and executed less self-consciously. Anyone whose read Series of Unfortunate Events is aware of the author's insistence on always keeping one foot in the story. Handler is notorious for his winking asides to the audience and references back to himself, and there's some of that in this book too--in that you feel just a little too uncomfortably aware of the mechanics operating behind it all. You can almost envision Handler clapping himself on the back for all of his cleverness. My favorite part of this book was Handler's contribution to the jacket that mocks self-congratulatory authors. Surprisingly (to use an adverb) the joke ends there, but the self-congratulatory part does not.
July 24, 2007
A self-indulgent, unreadable, too-clever-for-its-own good failure from the author of the Lemony Snicket series.
One is reminded of Sir Arthur Sullivan, who is said to have been unhappy his entire life, dismissing the success of all of the Gilbert and Sullivan operettas, mourning his failure to succeed with more "serious" composition.
One is reminded of Sir Arthur Sullivan, who is said to have been unhappy his entire life, dismissing the success of all of the Gilbert and Sullivan operettas, mourning his failure to succeed with more "serious" composition.
September 28, 2022
i do not understand
Read
February 2, 2026I liked this though the first few chapters had me worried. DH can be irritating but I like a lot of what he does. For instance: tragedy/catastrophe. Matter of factness. Strange, old fashioned food and drink (the obscure "party drinks" in this put me in mind of the square hard boiled egg in Why We Broke Up).
May 11, 2024
Parts of this book were really good but for the most part I just really was not into it. Meh 🤷♀️
September 5, 2020
you know that type of cartoon illustration where it's a full view of a park or city street and there's a bunch of people doing things and the closer you look the more intricate and amusing each part of the picture gets? that's what it's like reading this "novel". i put quotation marks because Adverbs is classified as a novel but in quite a different sense.
the book is a collection of non-linear short circumstances with different characters (many of which share the same name and sometimes may actually be the same person) in each chapter (aptly named after an adverb) and through their curious and at times almost lowkey magical experiences #DanielHandler provides explications of what Love is. what i liked most here are his fresh, exciting ways of doing that. all of Love had been explored by so many literature at this point it's hard to find works that would do so in a different manner and would make you see love from an actually more unique perspective.
Handler is a master of wordplay and just structuring amusing paragraphs. sometimes the attempts at humor may seem too much or too tongue-in-cheek but you'll trust him nonetheless because he's a very skillful writer overall and you know he won't let you down, unless you're looking for a more solid "story" with a solid beginning middle and end, because that's not what this is going for.
i know the way i described it here makes it seem like a heavily overwhelming, complicated book but it's honestly not at all. his language is super casual yet it succeeds in leading you to (maybe) deep thoughts or will simply just make you smile at his lyrical choreographies on what our favorite feeling does to us and how we see each other.
read this if you're into::
* various definitions of love
* word gymnastics and sentences that are fun to read aloud
* looking for something different from your everyday YA-type, regular novel kinda thing
the book is a collection of non-linear short circumstances with different characters (many of which share the same name and sometimes may actually be the same person) in each chapter (aptly named after an adverb) and through their curious and at times almost lowkey magical experiences #DanielHandler provides explications of what Love is. what i liked most here are his fresh, exciting ways of doing that. all of Love had been explored by so many literature at this point it's hard to find works that would do so in a different manner and would make you see love from an actually more unique perspective.
Handler is a master of wordplay and just structuring amusing paragraphs. sometimes the attempts at humor may seem too much or too tongue-in-cheek but you'll trust him nonetheless because he's a very skillful writer overall and you know he won't let you down, unless you're looking for a more solid "story" with a solid beginning middle and end, because that's not what this is going for.
i know the way i described it here makes it seem like a heavily overwhelming, complicated book but it's honestly not at all. his language is super casual yet it succeeds in leading you to (maybe) deep thoughts or will simply just make you smile at his lyrical choreographies on what our favorite feeling does to us and how we see each other.
read this if you're into::
* various definitions of love
* word gymnastics and sentences that are fun to read aloud
* looking for something different from your everyday YA-type, regular novel kinda thing
January 21, 2010
I don't generally write reviews, but this book disappointed me to the degree that I feel compelled to write one anyway. Honestly, I'm a bit surprised I managed to make it to the end.
One thing that drove me insane was how difficult it was to follow which characters were belonged where, and how they were connected to each other. The author drops these hints as to who someone is- a girl mentioned in passing in one passage suddenly receives a central role in another. Little tidbits like this make you jump backward constantly trying to connect all the little dots that are teased at here, yet this leaves you with nothing but a headache. The cast is too large, and it all gets tangled together. Admittedly, it seemed charming when described in the dust jacket, but the reality of it doesn't play out well at all. There is no definite transition from one character to another; sometimes, the irregularity of it throws you off, though not in a good way. Maybe it's just me, but when an author throws hints of this or that at me, my mind immediately tries to make the connections.
Also, the author tries to force certain images on the reader for no apparent reason. Magpies and ripped purses come to mind. It all seems to be tied up with an attempt to be clever that doesn't quite translate. The author's use of adverbs to describe the type of loving that's occurring also fails to translate. It's a cute idea, but it always just seems forced, the adverbs stuck in at random points of the stories because that's the way the book is supposed to be structured, even when it feels like you trying to force the wrong puzzle piece into place.
The reason that I'm giving this book 2 stars as opposed to one is because many of the insights into the nature of love are thought-provoking and well done. Some go over the top, but it doesn't necessarily take away from the ones that don't. This is clearly the focus of the author's attention, however, and the narrative suffers because of this. It seems as though in the beginning Handler was attempting to craft individual voices for the characters, and it actually worked. But this was lost as the book progressed, where later stories featuring the same characters didn't have the individuality they possessed in the earlier ones.
I apologize if this seems like a lot of nit-picking. Perhaps it's an instance of finding one fault and that leading to a whole flood of them; perhaps the overall setup of this book just isn't for me. All I know is that I wouldn't recommend it to anyone else.
One thing that drove me insane was how difficult it was to follow which characters were belonged where, and how they were connected to each other. The author drops these hints as to who someone is- a girl mentioned in passing in one passage suddenly receives a central role in another. Little tidbits like this make you jump backward constantly trying to connect all the little dots that are teased at here, yet this leaves you with nothing but a headache. The cast is too large, and it all gets tangled together. Admittedly, it seemed charming when described in the dust jacket, but the reality of it doesn't play out well at all. There is no definite transition from one character to another; sometimes, the irregularity of it throws you off, though not in a good way. Maybe it's just me, but when an author throws hints of this or that at me, my mind immediately tries to make the connections.
Also, the author tries to force certain images on the reader for no apparent reason. Magpies and ripped purses come to mind. It all seems to be tied up with an attempt to be clever that doesn't quite translate. The author's use of adverbs to describe the type of loving that's occurring also fails to translate. It's a cute idea, but it always just seems forced, the adverbs stuck in at random points of the stories because that's the way the book is supposed to be structured, even when it feels like you trying to force the wrong puzzle piece into place.
The reason that I'm giving this book 2 stars as opposed to one is because many of the insights into the nature of love are thought-provoking and well done. Some go over the top, but it doesn't necessarily take away from the ones that don't. This is clearly the focus of the author's attention, however, and the narrative suffers because of this. It seems as though in the beginning Handler was attempting to craft individual voices for the characters, and it actually worked. But this was lost as the book progressed, where later stories featuring the same characters didn't have the individuality they possessed in the earlier ones.
I apologize if this seems like a lot of nit-picking. Perhaps it's an instance of finding one fault and that leading to a whole flood of them; perhaps the overall setup of this book just isn't for me. All I know is that I wouldn't recommend it to anyone else.
February 18, 2019
I started reading this book in the morning on a Wednesday. As I was making eggs I turned to the first page and began to read a somewhat confusing piece of work. Suddenly the doorbell rang and I put everything down to see a UPS driver here to deliver a package. Had I ordered something, maybe but I couldn't remember. Jon had woken up that same morning trying to decide what to wear only to pick out the same outfit he wore the day before, Debra came into the room and when had she ever looked at him? How many Debra's do you think there are in the world? At least 15 I think.
My eggs were burning but I needed to sign for this package. Signing packages is such a strange thing, does it have to actually be your name and do they really care if it isn't? One time I scribbled nonsense onto the electric pad and they didn't say anything. Kindof like couponing on a Sunday with your mom. Speaking of which, I should call her just to make sure she's doing okay and ask her how many Debra's she thinks there are in the world.
Jon has a lovely face, he looks like someone who would like birds. I had a bird once, Dad let it fly around the house sometimes or was it Debra that let it out? In any case, the bird flew out the door, which is the same door I'm standing at now as my house is on fire since I went on this long tangent and forgot about my eggs. Why do I eat eggs anyway? They never taste as good as it looks on the Food Network. Chelsea makes good eggs but I haven't seen her in years. Maybe if I look up "good egg recipes" something worthwhile will pop up.
I sign for the package and realize that my house doesn't exist, I've been on a street corner waiting to cross the street imagining what I would do. Jon passes by me in the same thing he wore yesterday, but me too because we're wearing the same thing. Mark approaches and hands me a key "not today" he says. THE END
TL;DR if you got through that passage I wrote and didn't think it was a waste of time then you'll love this book. To be honest, I don't understand some of the reviews raving about how great it is. It's endlessly confusing and the long random tangents are really difficult to follow. I finished the book because I wanted to give it a fair shot & an honest review. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to appreciate the really good quotes to their fullest because trying to make sense of the words in between had most of my attention & concentration.
I read books to have fun & enjoy myself but personally, this wasn't neither fun or enjoyable.
My eggs were burning but I needed to sign for this package. Signing packages is such a strange thing, does it have to actually be your name and do they really care if it isn't? One time I scribbled nonsense onto the electric pad and they didn't say anything. Kindof like couponing on a Sunday with your mom. Speaking of which, I should call her just to make sure she's doing okay and ask her how many Debra's she thinks there are in the world.
Jon has a lovely face, he looks like someone who would like birds. I had a bird once, Dad let it fly around the house sometimes or was it Debra that let it out? In any case, the bird flew out the door, which is the same door I'm standing at now as my house is on fire since I went on this long tangent and forgot about my eggs. Why do I eat eggs anyway? They never taste as good as it looks on the Food Network. Chelsea makes good eggs but I haven't seen her in years. Maybe if I look up "good egg recipes" something worthwhile will pop up.
I sign for the package and realize that my house doesn't exist, I've been on a street corner waiting to cross the street imagining what I would do. Jon passes by me in the same thing he wore yesterday, but me too because we're wearing the same thing. Mark approaches and hands me a key "not today" he says. THE END
TL;DR if you got through that passage I wrote and didn't think it was a waste of time then you'll love this book. To be honest, I don't understand some of the reviews raving about how great it is. It's endlessly confusing and the long random tangents are really difficult to follow. I finished the book because I wanted to give it a fair shot & an honest review. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to appreciate the really good quotes to their fullest because trying to make sense of the words in between had most of my attention & concentration.
I read books to have fun & enjoy myself but personally, this wasn't neither fun or enjoyable.
March 31, 2008
I became interested in this book after reading a rave review by a user on this very website (Hey! It works!). I picked the book up yesterday and have already finished it. That never happens with me. Generally there at least 20 naps taken between covers. As you will see if you read any other reviews this "novel" is more a series of intertwined vignettes. All stories about love framed in chapters named after various adverbs: Immediately, Briefly, Obviously, Clearly, Naturally, etc. Also, if you've read other reviews, you'll see that there are people who have a problem with this. The sequences of events don't follow any sort of order, and characters who pop back into different chapters may or may not be recurring--they could just share the same name as a previous character. So it can get confusing and confusion, rightly so, frustrates some readers. I just chose to believe that if there weren't other obvious references to a previously mentioned character, than this was somebody new with the same name. Most experience, after all, is universal. And in the end, it doesn't matter, as Handler says in the book it's not about the people's names, or various recurring themes (like cocktails, magpies, volcanoes, and the Ice Queen)--it's about love and all the various shapes and forms that love takes in our lives. It's not cheesy, there are no tears to be shed (although it's not without its touching moments). It's clever, original, and Handler certainly (clearly, obviously, surely, blatantly,undoubtedly, and definitely--badump bump) has a way with words.
Here's one of my favorite passages:
This is love, saltwater taffy. Pretty much everybody has had some. Somebody offers it on a day when you have nothing to do, and most likely you'll take it and put it in your mouth. It unites us, saltwater taffy, but whose favorite is it? Who likes it best? Just about nobody. So why do we eat it? This love story is about this style of love, this sweet thing that exists unasked for, that everybody eats out of the same bag. But also it is about what it says on the shack. I was there myself, and the large sign said: COME IN AND WATCH US MAKE IT.
Here's one of my favorite passages:
This is love, saltwater taffy. Pretty much everybody has had some. Somebody offers it on a day when you have nothing to do, and most likely you'll take it and put it in your mouth. It unites us, saltwater taffy, but whose favorite is it? Who likes it best? Just about nobody. So why do we eat it? This love story is about this style of love, this sweet thing that exists unasked for, that everybody eats out of the same bag. But also it is about what it says on the shack. I was there myself, and the large sign said: COME IN AND WATCH US MAKE IT.
January 26, 2011
I am utterly and totally confused by this book. To start off this review, I think a quote from the author about this book would be appropriate.
Quoth Handler "Yes, there's a volcano in the novel. In my opinion a volcano automatically makes a story more interesting." And there is a volcano in the novel, it seems to be one of his favorite things to talk about. In addition to this there is an abundance of birds, alcohol, and taxis.
I'd like to provide a timeline and a list of characters but the story is so jambled it wouldn't make sense. The characters all reoccur during the novel but are so unmemorable you can't keep track of who's who. In addition, some seem to have mystical powers in what is otherwise, a realistic fiction type book.
The novel is supposed to be about love, different forms and presentations of it. However, if Handler's love is supposed to be real love it scares me. Most of his characters are stalkerish in quality and their love is very superficial. There are several divorces, break ups, hook ups and just plain fake love. At the end it seems several of the female characters are pregnant and possibly this means another type of love to the author.
Handler's writing style is very disjointed. I think he tries to be more flowery and "hip" with his writing than he needs to be. It jumps around so much that you just get lost and confused. The book, at 272 pages went on way too long for my tastes. If you like the odd and random type of book go ahead and read, otherwise I recommend spending your time on a better piece of literature.
Quoth Handler "Yes, there's a volcano in the novel. In my opinion a volcano automatically makes a story more interesting." And there is a volcano in the novel, it seems to be one of his favorite things to talk about. In addition to this there is an abundance of birds, alcohol, and taxis.
I'd like to provide a timeline and a list of characters but the story is so jambled it wouldn't make sense. The characters all reoccur during the novel but are so unmemorable you can't keep track of who's who. In addition, some seem to have mystical powers in what is otherwise, a realistic fiction type book.
The novel is supposed to be about love, different forms and presentations of it. However, if Handler's love is supposed to be real love it scares me. Most of his characters are stalkerish in quality and their love is very superficial. There are several divorces, break ups, hook ups and just plain fake love. At the end it seems several of the female characters are pregnant and possibly this means another type of love to the author.
Handler's writing style is very disjointed. I think he tries to be more flowery and "hip" with his writing than he needs to be. It jumps around so much that you just get lost and confused. The book, at 272 pages went on way too long for my tastes. If you like the odd and random type of book go ahead and read, otherwise I recommend spending your time on a better piece of literature.
July 14, 2007
After having read The Basic Eight and a few of the volumes in A Series of Unfortunate Events, I picked this up for a light and absorbing plane-read on my way to a funeral. I was thrilled, then, to find it both unexpectedly poignant and powerful. Handler's easygoing and conversational voice effortlessly masks true linguistic prowess, allowing me to read his stories as breezily or as pensively as I chose. Truly a book of linked short stories, rather than a "novel" as the back cover suggests, the brief and wonderful character connections between stories provide an additional layer of resonance (and, as in all story collections, some pieces are stronger than others; "soundly," in particular, stood out to me as near-perfect). If anything, the "adverbs" device -- each story begins with an adverb describing the particular brand of love highlighted within -- while clever, was almost too trite for such a deep, subtle, and lovely collection.
July 26, 2007
funny, wordsmithy, delightfully quirky. i like the occasionally intruding author's voice ("those are my wife's favorite cookies") in the lives of the characters -- kinda kundera-like in that way. the music references were fun, and i like the mixing of real bands and songs with made-up ones. but there was an authorial distance, a real arms-length narration the whole way through -- sometimes overly clever, snickety, let's have a looksee at what our hapless little characters are doing -- that prevented me from ever getting emotionally involved. i wanted handler to come out and play, but i got the feeling he was trying to hide in that voice. like, pay no attention to the man behind the curtain. and the overlapping narratives, the vaguely 9-11ey volcanic "event," the impromptu (mostly too cutesy) digressions on the nature of love... all that seemed a bit concocted. i didn't get the feeling that anyone in this book, including the author, had really suffered, ever.
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