The Virgin Suicides

Product Details

Author : Jeffrey Eugenides
Binding : Paperback
EAN : 9780747560593
Edition : New edition
Number of Pages : 256
Product Group : Book
Publication Date : 2002-10-07
Publisher : Bloomsbury Publishing PLC

ASIN : 0747560595

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Editorial Reviews

Review

Wry and wistful, melancholy yet flecked with a dark thread of humour, Eugenides's novel is a remarkable debut to say the very least. The protagonists of the title are a group of adolescent sisters who kill themselves, one after the other, in a Seventies summer that stays immaculately preserved in the memories of the young boys who hero-worshipped these elusive creatures from afar. Set in suburban America, it's a bizarre story and one that in lesser hands could easily have tumbled into the melodramatic, but everything is handled here with enviable fluidity and the potentially macabre becomes instead gently luminous. It's told retrospectively and collectively by all the boys, represented with a single voice as they look back at their youth two decades on and remember the fascination that the Lisbon sisters exerted over their prosaic lives, endowing everything with a touch of mystery. As they piece together their story from fragments of information presented in the form of exhibits, the lives of these girls become almost a touchstone of youth, a melange of memory distilled into a single bright image. Virtually imprisoned inside their claustrophobic home, not by malice but by sheer ignorance, the sisters find different ways to assert their individuality and Eugenides's description of the ball, their only date, is heartbreakingly poignant in the way it depicts the quartet grabbing every moment of delicious freedom like drowning swimmers gasping for air. Despite the sad subject there are many humorous touches like the image of the brassiere casually draped over the crucifix, but one of the book's most moving moments comes near the end when, desperate for contact and slowly sinking into their final spiralling despair, the girls play snatches of plaintive songs down the phone, the boys responding with cheerful anthems of teenage hope they intend as salve to the girls' loneliness. Beautifully written and intensely poetic in style, this novel may be an acquired taste for some but no one could deny the power of imagination necessary to conjure this haunting vision of a family slowly torn apart by the spectre of suicide. (Kirkus UK)

Independent

"The Virgin Suicides is wonderfully original. It could prove to be the start of an important writing career."

Observer

"One of the finest novels in many years - a Catcher in the Rye for our time"

Jay McInerney

"Beautiful funny and touching… Eugenides is a skilful craftsman and a hypnotic storyteller."

Book Description

Jeffrey Eugenides classic debut novel and now a major film, THE VIRGIN SUICIDES is the haunting, humorous and tender story of the brief lives of the five entrancing Lisbon sisters.Originally published by Bloomsbury and now available from us in paperback for the first time, alongside his fantastic new novel MIDDLESEX.'Jeffrey Eugenides is not promising: he is the real, achieved thing the book is light as air, and also quietly, slyly funny one of the finest novels in many years a CATCHER IN THE RYE for our time' OBSERVER

Observer

"the book is as light as air, and as dense; it is also quietly, slyly funny, despite its melancholy subject."

John Banville

"one of the finest novels - I have read in many years... a wonderful mixture of amusement, wistfulness and contained grief"

Product Description

The shocking thing about the girls was how nearly normal they seemed when their mother let them out for the one and only date of their lives. Twenty years on, their enigmatic personalities are embalmed in the memories of the boys who worshipped them and who now recall their shared adolescence: the brassiere draped over a crucifix belonging to the promiscuous Lux; the sisters' breathtaking appearance on the night of the dance; and the sultry, sleepy street across which they watched a family disintegrate and fragile lives disappear.

Synopsis

The shocking thing about the girls was how nearly normal they seemed when their mother let them out for the one and only date of their lives. Twenty years on, their enigmatic personalities are embalmed in the memories of the boys who worshipped them and who now recall their shared adolescence: the brassiere draped over a crucifix belonging to the promiscuous Lux; the sisters' breathtaking appearance on the night of the dance; and the sultry, sleepy street across which they watched a family disintegrate and fragile lives disappear.

About the Author

Jeffrey Eugenides was educated at Stanford and Brown Universities and now lives in Berlin. He is the author of MIDDLESEX.

Customer Reviews

Leaves a bad taste.... (2008-07-15)

This is a very powerful story, following the suicides of five girls from the same family, as seen through the eyes of a group of boys.It is grim, emotional, and depressing at times, yet at others will make you smile at the touching observations that makes it seem all too real.Its certainly a book that will stay with you for a while after you've read it - whether this is a good or bad thing, I don't know! Just make sure your next book afterwards has a happier ending!

In A League of Its Own (2008-03-27)

This is a book that is so thrilling, wonderful, gripping and fascinating that it belongs, not just in a league of its own, but in a world of its own. I never held quite "faith" in the second-person narrator until I read this novel; it feels slow to begin with but this is necessary in that it casts you in the rich, summer-like spell, almost a dreamlike trance, that means you are literally carried away. Apart from the heartbreaking and stunningly realistic ending, it never takes any particular "dramatic" twists: this could be dull or boring in less skilled hands than Eugenides', but it only serves to sustain the illusion that this is not fiction, or a novel, but life. Things do not happen fast in life. They can be a steady build-up of emotion and small things, that leads to a conclusion. I would compare it to To Kill A Mockingbird and Lolita in the strangely dreamy feeling that overtakes you while reading it, and spins you into the web of this remarkable tragedy. It is not a book I would recommend to everyone, but I loved it.

The Virgin Suicides (2008-01-11)

This was a very easy book to read - I found it hard to put down, particularly towards the end. It is very sad - the waste of the girls' lives and their isolation and desperation, but with glimpses of humour, albeit of a very dark nature. The author writes very well, with good use of description without going over the top.

Perfection. (2008-01-08)

"The Virgin Suicides" The story of 5 east side teens that lead troubled lives and one by one slowly "hurl" themselves from the world. Its is beautifully crafted and never gets old. The main theme of the novel being that one person can never truly understand/know another. This book is well worth the purchase if you seem to regularly find yourself at a loose end. This will fill up your time and with each consecutive read you will fall deeper within the novel and perceive/understand things you didn't the time(s) before that.5*!

Dire (2007-12-07)

Total disappointment!! After forcing myself to the half way mark, I realised chinese water torture would have been preferable to continuing to the end of this bland weak tedious washout. Save your money!!

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