The Invisible Circus

By: Jennifer Egan

Narrated by: Madeleine Lambert

Length: 11 hrs and 21 mins

Publisher's summary

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

Too bad zero was not a choice...

I listened, or rather started to listen to this right after Nevil Shute's Trustee from the Toolroom. What a letdown. Eliptical gushing prose, frequent hyperbole concerning floating or despair, endless whining about real or imaginary childhood injustices, just hours of glop and never got better. i quit as our heroine had just figured out she had been lured, penniless and alone, into a heroin den. If you are a chickflick person you might like it. Even the mostly-half-in-tears narrator seemed bored with it. Buy Trustee from the Toolroom instead - you'll love it!!

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.

Made it 3 minutes into chapter 6

Sorry, but I have 2 pet peeves. 1) Narrators that mispronounce words and, 2) Stories that take FOREVER to get started.

Loved the Story

I very much loved the story,, but the narrator was way too much for me. At times I felt like she was just screaming the whole storyline of the main character and I didn't knew if I was going to make it through the whole book.

Worth listening to

I listened to this right after I listened to The Candy House, which made me think Jennifer Egan is a genius at storytelling, so I think I was biased in favor of the story before I even started. The premise that Phoebe and Wolf were finally able to emotionally digest Faith’s death with their shared experience was interesting, as were the dynamics of Phoebe’s family. Egan’s integration of the culture of the time was well done. I was 18 years old in 1978 like Phoebe, so I got it.

I didn’t particularly enjoy the narrator’s voice overall, although she did well evoking Wolf’s character. Ironically, it was Phoebe that the narrator did the poorest job portraying. Her voice for Phoebe sounded like a breathless 12 year old. I imagine a kind of melancholy would surround Phoebe.

Metaphor upon metaphor

This early Egan novel, set in the 70s, tells a story of growing up and family tragedy. It could have used a mighty editor who could have pared down the habit of describing every sound, sight, and atmospheric fact in clunky metaphor. The story kept me going but it was annoying. And I couldn’t quite forgive the narrator for pronouncing Chianti with a Ch like Charles….

Do not waste your time or money.

Where to start? Generally I like JE's books so I was hopeful even when I knew I should just stop torturing myself to finish it. This book is long, tedious and just plain dumb. Way too many references to "looking into her eyes, he could tell...." , "behind his eyes, all was revealed....", etc, etc. as if one can really know things by looking into another's eyes.

The main character, Phoebe, is insufferable and increasingly a less believable character as the book continues. Overall, the whole thing drags and drags--could have been half the length --might have been much better.
Lastly, not to mention that this book runs roughshod over the concept of mental health, even if it was taking place in the 1970s. There is no mention of the family dealing with the various deaths.

Do not waste your time or money.

Clueless narrator!

Doesn’t a narrator reading a story based in San Francisco have an obligation to listen to local pronunciations? As an example, she mispronounces Mayor Moscone’s name incorrectly, along with scores of other street and neighborhood names. The voice of Barry also sounded like a chronically congested cartoon character. The sex scenes went on too long. This was Jennifer Egan’s practice novel: a decent story that needed a good editor.

interesting story

it was an interesting story about a younger sister's quest to find out what happened to her older sister when she died, but I cringed when I heard the narrator pronounce Corniglia with a hard "G". it's pronounced Kor-nee-lee-uh. not Kor-nig-lee-uh. Also Moscone's name is pronounced wrong, and the locals never call Los Gatos the way she did, the correct Spanish way. It's Loss-ga-tis. Someone from San Francisco would know this.

Too long

I found this story to be endless. I couldn’t wait for it to finally be over!
It was hard to like the protagonist.