Title: What an irritating, banal, self-satisfied little book!
Product review: This is the story of Orno, who goes to college, dentistry school, marries his smarter, more interesting friend's sister and has a baby. I started thinking about that name "Orno." Is Canin slyly signalling to us that he agrees with us that his protagonist is a zero first and last? I wish I believed he were that subtle. (Although Dr. Canin certainly doesn't go to great lengths to hide his contempt for dentists.) The characters are two-dimensional, great swathes of the plot are boring, and all of it is derivative of the work of better writers. The real conflict is between Marshall ("Martial," get it?) and his father. The problem is they're off-screen most of the time, and we have to see everything through Orno's infuriatingly dim eyes. Skip this book, and read "A Secret History" instead. Same plot, much better written.
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