|
Editorial Review Amazon.com
Oprah Book Club® Selection, January 1997: "Mine is a story of craving; an unreliable account of lusts and troubles that began, somehow, in 1956 on the day our free television was delivered." So begins the story of Dolores Price, the unconventional heroine of Wally Lamb's She's Come Undone. Dolores is a class-A emotional basket case, and why shouldn't she be? She's suffered almost every abuse and familial travesty that exists: Her father is a violent, philandering liar; her mother has the mental and emotional consistency of Jell-O; and the men in her life are probably the gender's most loathsome creatures. But Dolores is no quitter; she battles her woes with a sense of self-indulgence and gluttony rivaled only by Henry VIII. Hers is a dysfunctional Wonder Years, where growing up in the golden era was anything but ideal. While most kids her age were dealing with the monumental importance of the latest Beatles single and how college turned an older sibling into a long-haired hippie, Dolores was grappling with such issues as divorce, rape, and mental illness. Whether you're disgusted by her antics or moved by her pathetic ploys, you'll be drawn into Dolores's warped, hilarious, Mallomar-munching world.Book Description
"Mine is a story of craving: an unreliable account of lusts and troubles that began, somehow, in 1956 on the day our free television was delivered...."Meet Dolores Price.She's 13, wise-mouthed but wounded, having bid her childhood goodbye.Beached like a whale in front of her bedroom TV, she spends the next few years nourishing herself with the Mallomars, potato chips, and Pepsi her anxious mother supplies.When she finally rolls into young womanhood at 257 pounds, Dolores is no stronger and life is no kinder.But this time she's determined to rise to the occasion and give herself one more chance before really going belly-up. In this extraordinary coming-of-age odyssey, Wally Lamb invites us to hitch a wild ride on a journey of love, pain, renewal with the most heartbreakingly comical heroine to come along in years.At once a fragile girl and a hard-edged cynic, so tough to love yet so inimitably lovable, Dolores is as poignantly real as our own imperfections.She's Come Undone includes a promise: you will never forget Dolores Price. ... Read more Customer Reviews (1663) 
Couldn't put it down
I could NOT put this book down.It's now one of my top recommendations to friends and family.One of my favorite books.
Undoing the past
She's Come Undone is a novel of disintegration. Dolores's life begins to unravel with the arrival of a free television set, though her life has always been poised to erode.
Like all unhappy families, Dorloros's is unhappy in its own, special way, though I admit that I'm getting tired about reading about unhappy families. It seems like this is yet another my-family-sucks-and-that's-why-I'm-so-messed-up book. It seems like people in America blame their parents for everything. Yes, your parents gave you your problems, but they're YOUR problems now. Deal with them and move on.
Lately, I've been branching out from the so-called chick lit genre into more diverse books just because, although Tolstoy would disagree, it seems like there are only so many variations on the unhappy family, and I think modern literature has run through them all.
Try Rabid: A Novel, for a truly original take on the unhappy family and recovery. It's a much better book.
Minna
One of the few fiction books I read regularly...
This book manages to be depressing and uplifting at the same time.I read it whenever I start to feel sorry for myself (about once a year for the past ten years) so I can remember that things can always be worse, and if they are worse, they can get better.
Fans of the Book of Job will love it.
A week after finishing this book, I still have conflicting opinions. It's hard to synthesize them into a coherent review, so I'm just going to summarize what I liked and disliked.
On the plus side:
Easy to read: The story is told as a first-person narrative by the main protagonist, Dolores. Though her actions can be exasperating to the point where you want to shake some sense into her, she is always engaging, keeping a sense of (sometimes gallows) humor as she recreates her story. And it's impossible not to admire Lamb's skill in writing from the perspective of an overweight, overwhelmed woman as he tracks her history over the 25-year span of the book.
Growth and development: It's incremental, it's painful, there is backsliding - but there is growth. The ending offers a measure of comfort, but to a degree that seems deliberately subdued - there is no fairy-tale ending here. Lamb is showing us that adversity can be overcome, but doing so is hard work. And don't get too comfortable - any ground that you gain in life could be lost overnight. There is something completely admirable in the way that Dolores doesn't simply buckle, but - against considerable odds - manages to reach a level of self-awareness that affords her a measure of contentment in her own skin
As against that: (WARNING - SOME PLOT DETAILS INCLUDED)
Hard to read: For the same reasons that the book of Job is not your favorite book of the bible. The tribulations just keep coming. Guilt about parents divorcing? Daddy abandonment issues? That's just the baseline. Let's pile on a little molestation, rape, 150 or so excess pounds, several years in a psychiatric facility, peer rejection and gratuitous cruelty, marriage to a philandering narcissist, abortion, and the death of almost everyone dear to you. You can almost hear Satan betting with that dear old-Testament God, as further trials are heaped on. Dolores's failure to conceive is almost a relief - at least we're spared the prospect of a child-immolation scene.
Growth and development: Wait now. Didn't I list this under the `things to like' section? Well, yes I did. So sue me for also disliking it. Because there is that unavoidable Oprah sticker right on the cover of this book. It's completely obvious why - the kind of uplift that is doled out makes this book a shoo-in for Oprah-approval. But it's hard not to feel that one is being emotionally manipulated throughout, on a grand scale. To which my -admittedly irrational - response is "If you're going to play the reader like a cheap violin, then at least have the decency to provide more of a feel-good ending than you do".
Dead whale metaphors: Give me a break! Was this really necessary? Best you could come up with? Why not just club the reader over the head and have done with it?
Also, if I were a lesbian, I think I'd be within my rights to be offended by this book.
You can tell I'm all over the map where this book is concerned. Which means it got under my skin more than I might like to admit. Which is what allows it to keep its third star.
In the end, a book more to admire than to like.
Good story
To me, this story is a cross between a Judy Blume book and Forest Gump. It was very good, but did seem to drag at times... it was close to 500 pages. She lives a dramatic life (you go from early childhood into her adult life) and the author does a great job painting the picture in your mind with wonderful description. It will tug at your emotions and can be difficult to put down. Some parts were a little raunchy for my taste with homosexual encounters. I would have liked the ending to have turned out differently. I don't believe you will be disappointed with this one, although it can be exhausting with as much life that is covered in one book with such drama involved. I could see this being made into a movie.
... Read more |
