I finally finished David Foster Wallace’s Infinite Jest. It took about five months (March to August) and two editions (trade paper and Kindle). Next, I need to spend some serious time and effort digesting it but for now I’m just glad to be done.
Overall: good.
Caveat(s): I’m sure I missed plenty of things I wished I hadn’t (check out the forums over at InfiniteSummer.org for a lot of that) and it doesn’t exactly have a Harry Potter esque wrap everything together chapter, which is frustrating.
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[...] Carlberg “Finished That Damn Book“. R.J. Adler of A Litinay of Noneselve hit page 500 in the novel and asked “Halfway to [...]
Ditto about no wrap-everything-up-nicely-chapter frustration. I mostly read non-fiction, so when I tighten my belt and tackle a 1,079-page novel, I want some goddamn closure, not the biggest missing ending of all time.
Yeah so I was reading it on a Kindle and it said 86% (it gives you a percent done on everything) so when I got to the end, clicked Next Page and just saw notes I was completely surprised.
Completely.
Then I went back and read The Year of Glad at the beginning.
Anyway, it brings up a lot of good and interesting questions by ending that way even if I get a little irritated at having to ask them.
I just finished recently and, like Reid, went back to the beginning, where I had the WTF? experience of reading the following sentence:
“I think of John N.R. Wayne, who would have won this year’s WhataBurger, standing watch in a mask as Donald Gately and I dig up my father’s head.”
Sorry, I don’t know anyone here, but needed to share this with someone for whom I would not be a spoiler. This has to be a key to the whole thing, I think, and at least point to closure.
Thanks for swinging by.
I didn’t re-read that far into Chapter 1 — i’m glad you pointed it out. Saw something on the forums but didn’t yet take the time to find it in detail. What happened to John NR Wayne’s face?
I think I need to take a year off and then read this again. I hope it doesn’t take me five months the second time.
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