Review: The Candy House by Jennifer Egan

short review:

I enjoyed the experience of reading this book but it isn’t what I was expecting based on reading the blurb in the bookstore or even the first two chapters at home. I did love those first chapters. They take place following a tech visionary after his fortune has been as he wanders around the streets of Manhattan sometimes reminiscing on his time as an NYU undergrad. I found this decently relatable in some regards and therefore I was hooked! I was secretly hoping for a the narrative to continue linearly but it didn’t. I was eager for deep dive into this character and his mind, Bix Bouton (the tech billionaire), is not seen, heard from again or even mentioned in a meaningful way until the penultimate chapter (which was also excellent).

The only other Jennifer Egan novel I’ve read is A Visit from the Goon Squad which did really move me. This book is like that book, even characters from Goon Squad vaguely appear in Candy House. The writing is engaging and there are those sparks of joy as you watch the interconnectedness unfold but some of the chapters I found to be entirely forgettable specifically the chapter that is written entirely as one sentence instructions for a secret government operative and the chapter that is written entirely in email exchanges. I didn’t really care for those chapters and I mostly just wanted them to be over quickly. I read enough emails in my real life.

Still this is a quick and worthwhile read and I suspect that either Candy House, Goon Squad or both with be made into a movie so you should read both so that when you see the movie you can confidently say: “The book was better.”

favorite quotes:

• “He took a picture of the poster and then, just for fun, tore off one of the paper tabs from the bottom of ‘Let’s Talk’ and slipped it into his pocket, marveling at the fact that, even in the new world he’d helped to make, people still taped pages to lampposts.” (p. 7)

• “The absence of a new vision destabilized his sense of everything he’d done; what was it worth if it let to nothing—if, by forty, he was reduced to buying or stealing the rest of his ideas?” (p. 13)

• “Alfred began, on occasion, to scream in public: on the L train; in Times Square; at Whole Foods; at the Whitney.” (p. 32)

• “She was twenty-four, still in the adventure phase of her move to New York City to work for a graphic design firm. Alfred was almost twenty-nine.” (p. 32)

• “’The truth is right there.’ ‘Isn’t it always?’” (p. 45)

• “I bridged the gaps with peanut butter, which I ate by the jar, and teenage energy.” (p. 51)

• “All of which made me

  more

  irritable, because I sensed that I was failing when all I’d ever done, my whole life, was try to succeed.” (p. 51)

• “She was a genius at capturing offhand moments and making them look iconic.” (p. 52)

• “Rob’s folks passed away in the pandemic, just a few weeks apart.” (p. 59)

• “Last Halloween, M came to work in a teacup costume. It says a lot about a person that she could come to work dressed as a teacup.” (p. 77)

• “While our exchange is not entirely friends, there is the encouraging fact that we’ve reached line seven without awkwardness, defining awkwardness as conversation consisting of a series of futile attempts to solve the problem of what to say next.” (p. 87)

• “So I force myself to plan a barbecue for my new team at my home—an undertaking that would be simple if I weren’t dogged to the point of sleeplessness by questions like: Will people have fun? Will it be my fault if they don’t have fun? Will they hold it against me forever if they don’t have fun? Will they tell others who weren’t present that they didn’t have fun, and will that knowledge permanently reduce those others’ opinions of me?” (p. 94)

• “He spoke to her in subdued tones, and she watched him evenly with her hazel eyes that seemed to blink less than most people’s. He was always the one to look away.” (p. 113)

• “Rolph was twenty-eight when he died.” (p. 116)

• “Why don’t you like talking about them? It’s like trying to make myself heard from the bottom of a well. Who has the energy to deal with a small sad woman at the bottom of a well?” (p. 120)

• “And us? We were twenty-three and twenty-four, still near enough to college that functioning as adults felt like pulling something off.” (p. 124)

• “Nowadays, a man ill at ease in surroundings will pull out his phone, request the Wi-Fi password, and rejoin a virtual sphere where his identity is instantly reaffirmed. Let us all take a moment to consider deeply what isolation was customary before these times arrived!” (p. 135)

• “There are still some mysteries left.” (p. 137)

• “Not every story needs to be told.” (p. 139)

• “But friendship risks the end of friendship, and Roxy has moved through too many friends in her life.” (p. 152)

• “…kindness and coolness do not go together in girls, being cool means you leave people out, that is the actual definition of the word because if you’re nice to everyone, then why should people near you feel special and why should people NOT near you WANT to be near you, and why should anyone assume that they Times they are having without you are worse than the Times they would be having with you?” (p. 189)

• “I am ALONE AND PEACEFUL and that combination is so unusual, it’s like meeting someone for the first time.” (p. 195)

• “….I sit down on the grass and I’m like Hello Molly, it’s nice to sit with you here, actually saying the words out loud but very softly, and I hug my warm knees and look up at the big sky and there is the moon Lulu pointed out earlier except it’s bigger now and still fragile-looking like it’s made out of sugar or paper and could break or tear easily, but already it’s brighter than before, and it isn’t even night.” (p. 195)

• “White, is not, technically speaking, a bright color. White is, nevertheless, bright.” (p. 206)

• “It’s easier to believe in a foregone conclusion than to accept that our lives are governed by random chance.” (p. 224)

• “Human beings are superhuman. Let the moon and the stars direct you.” (p. 226)

• “

  The secret to a happy ending,

  Mom used to tell us,

  is knowing when to walk away

  . Once I’ve seen Mom leaning against the fence with Jules, I force myself not to look again. (p. 246)

• “Doesn’t it ever occur to you that another entity might be looking through your eyes and listening through your ears or uttering words through your mouth?” (p. 290)

• “Now, from his waterbed, Gregory could hear his roommate bustling around their small common area preparing a spate of last-minute weed deliveries to ease people through

  snow quarantine.

  ” (p. 305)

• “’Maybe not-writing is what’s draining you,’ she said. ‘Maybe you’ve severed your energy source.’” (p. 321)