Bool 87 - Jeffrey Eugenides "The Virgin Suicides"

Jeffrey Eugenides "The Virgin Suicides" (Fourth Estate)






This was a really memorable, intense read that speaks of unrequited love and the end of childhood. It was a novel that I enjoyed a lot, despite having this sat on my bookshelf for a good few months and only just getting around to reading it.

The Virgin Suicides takes a story of everyday suburban life in the 1970's and re-crafts it to be a tale of dark postmodern humour with creepily persistent narrators collectively recapping their youth and their obsession with five suicidal sisters. It is something of a mystery as to why the five sisters killed themselves and even now, years later, this now balding group of men are still trying to unravel it and have disturbingly gathered evidence and testimonials of the time to try and put the pieces together once and for all.

I found this book to be effective owing to the narrator's style, as the person or persons remain a bit of a mystery and are never identified but have witnessed the whole situation from the start. The real impression given to the reader through the description and prose is that you too are surveying the neighbourhood and the Lisbon household and that you have also been pulled into their world.

Though the book was admittedly odd and gloomy and the subject matter was complex, there was just something appealing about it that spoke to me. Generally, the underlying message I took from it was the story of destroyed innocence in a suburban community that has never fully recovered from a tragedy and that of dysfunctional family relationships. I would recommend trying the novel yourself if you enjoy contemporary fiction with a difference.