Title: more hype than substance
Product review: Eggers is actively soliciting e-contributions to this column, and that speaks to a certain unsavory neediness that cries out (and frequently whines out) on almost every page of this tiresomely overhyped production. Don't get me wrong, there's some good writing here, but it's good in the way of an angry, self-confident twentysomething rattling the bars of the human cage-- as we all rattled them once upon a time-- and in the end, what really works here is less the story than the projected attitude of the writer. Whether Eggers can tell a story, write a REAL novel, whether he's a real writer or simply someone who had particularly bad-- uniquely bad-- luck as a human being and turned that bad luck into literary grist for profit-- this question will only be answered when he steps up to the plate for his next at-bat.
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