Certainly, no character would lead a single-sentence synopsis. To its credit, A Visit from the Goon Squad eludes a concise summary.
A picture on the mantle, the name of a band, even a hairpin-these things come back, and when they do, you had better be ready to recall everything that comes with them, not on the punishment of being lost to the rest of the book if you can’t-this is not one of those puzzle novels that require you to fit every piece precisely-but instead because Egan’s feat here is formidable, and if you are investing the time anyway, so you might as well make a good faith effort to pick up everything she is putting down. Such is the sprawling nature of Egan’s book that your radar had better be finely tuned as you read. Eventually, they just got weird: “Lulu – D’s daughter, popular at school, visits G, becomes Bennie’s assistant and helps promote Scotty’s concert in the future”, the weirdness here deriving from that word “future”, which in this context refers to the capital “F” variety in which people travel via 6th Avenue skyscraper corridors and strollers are prohibited at public events because they inhibit evacuations. This is all for just one chapter, mind you.Īs I read deeper into the book, the notes became less predictable, the relationships more intricate: “Dolly/La Doll (Peale) – Steph’s boss from before, hired by the General for PR Arc – The G’s HR Captain The General – a genocidal dictator Kitty Jackson – movie star, attacked by Jules (S’s brother)”. At first, the connections were just the stuff of so much unrequited love: “Bennie – wants Alice Alice – rich, wants Scotty Rhea – narrator, loves Bennie Jocelyn – bff, disappears w/ Lou Lou – exec Scotty – wants Jocelyn, eye spots”.
Halfway through chapter three of Jennifer Egan’s knockout new novel, A Visit from the Goon Squad, I started jotting down character names and relationships in the margins.
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