The Invisible Circus

De: Jennifer Egan

Narrado por: Madeleine Lambert

In Pulitzer Prize-winner Jennifer Egan's highly acclaimed first novel, set in 1978, the political drama and familial tensions of the 1960s form a backdrop for the world of Phoebe O'Connor, age eighteen. Phoebe is obsessed with the memory and death of her sister Faith, a beautiful idealistic hippie who died in Italy in 1970. In order to find out the truth about Faith's life and death, Phoebe retraces her steps from San Francisco across Europe, a quest which yields both complex and disturbing revelations about family, love, and Faith's lost generation.

This spellbinding novel introduced Egan's remarkable ability to tie suspense with deeply insightful characters and the nuances of emotion.

©2012 Jennifer Egan (P)2012 AudioGO

Time warp to SF in the ‘70’s

Too focused on the Europe part. Good family dynamics. Econ is really good at that. I didn’t like the nasal voice of the reader, though I got used to it.

Hard to beat Jennifer Egan

Her writing is like listening to music. She makes it seem easy the way the story flows along. True genius!

Underwhelming

Narration had some issues: Barry always sounds congested, and Phoebe’s voice is frequently too over the top. The story just wasn’t very compelling.

I can't actually decide...

I was entertained by the book. I enjoyed the narrator. The story? I can't decide if it was incredible or completely contrived.

Too Many Metaphors

I love metaphors, but his was too much. Every action and object seemed to require one. This style slows down the story and keeps the reader at a distance. From such a talented writer this was disappointing. I usually enjoy reading in print more than audio books but this one would have frustrated me had I read it as a paper book.
The story is...okay. The characters are not as well developed as in other work by this author. So, just pretty good but not really good work from one of my favorite writers.