Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)"The Corrections" has been delivered with a blizzard of media hype than can be off-putting to the very readers the publishers want to reach (people starved for serious, readable, intelligent fiction.) But you really should get ahold of this excellent novel. I devoured it in one night's frenzied reading. Yes indeed, Franzen has taken the somewhat inaccessible avant-garde concerns of writers like Don DeLillo or the David Foster Wallace of "Infinite Jest" and placed them in the context of a mainstream novel about *family* and how it prepares you to function (or not) in the larger world. Franzen manages to create a little universe that mirrors our own crazy world, yet makes the madness more comprehensible. He is devilishly funny, in a laugh-out-loud sort of way, yet his message is ultimately one of forgiveness and reconciliation. The Lamberts, the screwed-up family at the heart of the story, have the feeling of real people you know. That are unique, unforgettable individuals, but you may squirm when the self-destructive ways of Gary, Chip or Denise remind you of the stupid mistakes you have made in your own life. Alfred and Enid, the mom and dad, will make you shake your head; when did Franzen meet *my* parents? The book becomes genuinely suspenseful as Enid struggles to get her wayward children home for "one last Christmas" before Alfred's decline becomes irrevocable. And don't let Franzen's bad-mouthing of Oprah deter you from reading this. Ironically, his comments are just the sort of thing one of the Lambert kids would say in order to sabotage themselves. It just proves Franzen really does know what he's talking about.
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