Thinking about you, just not talking to you

books:


	• The Path of Minor Planets: A Novel Andrew Sean Greer Picador, 2002 - 288 pages average customer review:based on 13 reviews view larger image
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highly recommended

Thinking about you, just not talking to you

Highly intelligent friends and lovers meet at 6 year intervals that coincide with the waxing and waning of a comet that one of them has discovered. I enjoyed the authors method of tying astronomical and human behavior and his philosophical insights of both. What bothered me is the characters behave too much like the orbiting bodies they study, circling each other but not communicating. I know that is the point of it but it was just to much to be believed. This thoughtful, intelligent novel of life, love and astronomy is worth the read.

Necessary read:

This is a gorgeous, gorgeous book. I picked it up soon after it came out because the cover caught my eye; was instantly curious after the description of a fiction book focused on astronomy and the summary on the back. I expected to like it, and after my first reading that was exactly my reaction, but a couple years later and after many, many more readthroughs this is without a doubt one of the most excellent books I have ever read.

Greer's language is astonishing, his observations are so applicable to the world and resonate in nearly any situation, his language is breathtaking. His metaphors make you stop and think and look up from the book; almost every other line is something I wish I could remember. The images he conveys and the difficult, almost very confusing plot he effortlessly pulls off is, again, beautiful, and so much more is gained from it after a second (or third, or fourth) read - more observations, more detail, more wisdom from the entire thing. There are so many tiny details that are smile-worthy, for lack of a better expression, and so many phrases that I was reading too quickly to notice at first but that really are wonderful and perfect. As multiple reviewers from the inside cover say and as the character Kathy in the novel notices, the "tiny hidden flaws in ordinary people" are what he is drawing out in this book - it is almost entirely character driven but it is incredible enough that to me, it does not get slow and it never gets boring, and the plot never disappears. There is always something new to find, every character is somehow likable and flaws are made understood and all right and acceptable without ever being brushed off (in fact, the characters' flaws is in many ways the focus of the novel). I would say that my favorite part is the many connections between astronomy, stars and comets (you do not have have to know anything about them to read the book), and human life, but I'm not sure that's true - it is honestly all too difficult to choose from. All the characters I love more every time I read it.

It's hard to get into at first (after the very beginning, which has a very slight resemblance to some of Contact, by Carl Sagan), but it is more than worth it. This is Andrew Sean Greer's first novel and while his second, The Confessions of Max Tivoli, has gotten much more press, I believe that The Path of Minor Planets deserves that and much more. This is absolute proof that an author's age has nothing to do with talent, and every time I look through this book again I think that is what it is: raw talent. It is very difficult for me to come up with a fault that really, honestly means anything about this book; I can barely recommend it enough and I encourage trying to get through the whole thing even though it's difficult at first, especially if you like beautiful (but never overdone) descriptive writing as much as I do. I have never been able to pick a favorite book but if I had to, this very well might be it. It is so much more than a romance novel (I think it is barely that at all...it's about how people *are*) and if it were up to me it would be assured to be in print for generations.

Read this book. Really.

Five hundred stars.

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A beautiful book

Like others, I wasn't immediately drawn into this book, but I stuck with it, and am so glad I did. This is one of those novels that leaves me narrating my day in its prose style all day long, and wishing I could write like this author. Very beautifully written. A story as much about language, literary and scientific, as it is about the characters and plot it contains. I loved it.

Great!

The used book that I ordered was in fantastic shape when it arrived. Like new! Delivery time was wonderful also. The best part is I didn't have to leave home to have it delivered to me!

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What a gorgeous book!

I absolutely loved this book. It was such an ambitious endeavour to capture this story over such a span of years. The writing is phenomonal. I'm recommending it to everyone I know.

reviews: page 1, 2, 3

In 1965, on a small island in the South Pacific, a group of astronomers gather to witness the passing of a comet, but when a young boy dies during a meteor shower, the lives of the scientists and their loved ones change in subtle yet profound ways. Denise struggles for respect in her professional life, married Eli becomes increasingly attracted to Denise and her quixotic mind, and young Lydia attempts to escape the scientists? long-casting shadows. Andrew Sean Greer?s remarkable and sweeping first novel is an exploration of chances taken and lost, of love found and broken, and of time?s subtle gravitational pull on the lives of everyday and extraordinary people.

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