This novel circles the lives of Bennie Salazar, an aging former punk rocker and record executive, and Sasha, the passionate, troubled young woman he employs. Although Bennie and Sasha never discover each other's pasts, the reader does, in intimate detail, along with the secret lives of a host of other characters.
Jennifer Eganis the author ofThe Keep, Look at Me, The Invisible Circus,and the story collectionEmerald City.Her stories have been published inThe New Yorker, Harper's Magazine, GQ, Zoetrope, All-Story,andPloughshares,and her nonfiction appears frequently inThe New York Times Magazine.She lives with her husband and sons in Brooklyn. From the Hardcover edition.
Jennifer Eganis the author of The Keep, Look at Me, The Invisible Circus,and the story collection Emerald City.Her stories have been published in The New Yorker, Harper's Magazine, GQ, Zoetrope, All-Story,and Ploughshares,and her nonfiction appears frequently in The New York Times Magazine.She lives with her husband and sons in Brooklyn. Visit the Jennifer Egan's official website: www.jenniferegan.com
The questions, discussion topics, and suggestions for further reading that follow are designed to enhance your group's discussion of Jennifer Egan's stunning new work, A Visit from the Goon Squad.In a satirical and oddly touching book, Egan brings to life the recent past, captures the confusions and ambiguities of the present, and speculates about the future of America.
The questions, discussion topics, and suggestions for further reading that follow are designed to enhance your group's discussion of Jennifer Egan?? stunning new work, A Visit from the Goon Squad.In a satirical and oddly touching book, Egan brings to life the recent past, captures the confusions and ambiguities of the present, and speculates about the future of America.
1. A Visit from the Goon Squad shifts among various perspectives, voices, and time periods, and in one striking chapter (pp. 234??09), departs from conventional narrative entirely. What does the mixture of voices and narrative forms convey about the nature of experience and the creation of memories? Why has Egan arranged the stories out of chronological sequence? 2. In ?? to B??Bosco unintentionally coins the phrase ??ime?? a goon??(p. 127), used again by Bennie in ??ure Language??(p. 332). What does Bosco mean? What does Bennie mean? What does the author mean? 3. ??ound Objects??and ??he Gold Cure??include accounts of Sasha?? and Bennie?? therapy sessions. Sasha picks and chooses what she shares: ??he did this for Coz?? protection and her own-they were writing a story of redemption, of fresh beginnings and second chances??(pp. 8??). Bennie tries to adhere to a list of no-no?? his shrink has supplied (p. 24). What do the tone and the content of these sections suggest about the purpose and value of therapy? Do they provide a helpful perspective on the characters? 4. Lou makes his first appearance in ??sk Me If I Care??(pp. 39??8) as an unprincipled, highly successful businessman; ??afari??(pp. 59??3) provides an intimate, disturbing look at the way he treats his children and lover; and ??ou (Plural)??(pp. 84??1) presents him as a sick old man. What do his relationships with Rhea and Mindy have in common? To what extent do both women accept (and perhaps encourage) his abhorrent behavior, and why to they do so? Do the conversations between Lou and Rolph, and Rolph?? interactions with his sister and Mindy, prepare you for the tragedy that occurs almost twenty years later? What emotions does Lou?? afternoon in ??ou (Plural)??with Jocelyn and Rhea provoke? Is he basically the same person he was in the earlier chapters? 5. Why does Scotty decide to get in touch with Bennie? What strategies do each of them employ as they spar with each other? How does the past, including Scotty?? dominant role in the band and his marriage to Alice, the girl both men pursued, affect the balance of power? In what ways is Scotty?? belief that ??ne key ingredient of so-called experience is the delusional faith that it is unique and special, that those included in it are privileged and those excluded from it are missing out??(p. 98) confirmed at the meeting? Is their reunion in ??ure Language??a continuation of the pattern set when they were teenagers, or does it reflect changes in their fortunes as well as in the world around them? 6. Sasha?? troubled background comes to light in ??ood-bye, My Love??(pp. 208??3). Do Ted?? recollections of her childhood explain Sasha?? behavior? To what extent is Sasha?? ??atalog of woes??(p. 213) representative of her generation as a whole? How do Ted?? feelings about his career and wife color his reactions to Sasha? What does the flash-forward to ??nother day more than twenty years after this one??(p. 233) imply about the transitory moments in our lives? 7. Musicians, groupies, and entertainment executives and publicists figure prominently in A Visit from the Goon Squad. What do the careers and private lives of Bennie, Lou, and Scotty (???? and O???? ??ure Language??; Bosco and Stephanie (?? to B??; and Dolly (??elling the General?? suggest about American culture and society over the decades? Discuss how specific details and cultural references (e.g., names of real people, bands, and venues) add authenticity to Egan?? fictional creations. 8. The chapters in this book can be read as stand-alone stories. How does this affect the reader?? engagement with individual characters and the events in their lives? Which characters or stories did you find the most compelling? By the end, does everything fall into place to form a satisfying storyline? 9. Read the quotation from Proust that Egan uses as an epigraph (p. ix). How do Proust?? observations apply to A Visit from the Goon Squad? What impact do changing times and different contexts have on how the characters perceive and present themselves? Are the attitudes and actions of some characters more consistent than others'', and if so, why? 10. In a recent interview Egan said, ?? think anyone who?? writing satirically about the future of America and life often looks prophetic. . . . I think we??e all part of a zeitgeist and we??e all listening to and absorbing the same things, consciously or unconsciously. . . .??( Brooklyn Daily Eagle, February 8, 2010). Considering current social trends and political realities, including fears of war and environmental devastation, evaluate the future Egan envisions in ??ure Language??and ??reat Rock and Roll Pauses.??11. What does ??ure Language??have to say about authenticity in a technological and digital age? Would you view the response to Bennie, Alex, and Lulu?? marketing venture differently if the musician had been someone other than Scotty Hausmann and his slide guitar? Stop/Go (from ??he Gold Cure??, for example? (For a complete list of available reading group guides, and to sign up for the Reading Group Center enewsletter, visit: www.readinggroupcenter.com.)
Jennifer Egan's spellbinding interlocking narratives circle the lives of Bennie Salazar, an aging former punk rocker and record executive, and Sasha, the passionate, troubled young woman he employs. Although Bennie and Sasha never discover each other's pasts, the reader does, in intimate detail, along with the secret lives of a host of other characters whose paths intersect with theirs, over many years, in locales as varied as New York, San Francisco, Naples, and Africa. We first meet Sasha in her mid-thirties, on her therapist's couch in New York City, confronting her long-standing compulsion to steal. Later, we learn the genesis of her turmoil when we see her as the child of a violent marriage, then as a runaway living in Naples, then as a college student trying to avert the suicidal impulses of her best friend. We plunge into the hidden yearnings and disappointments of her uncle, an art historian stuck in a dead marriage, who travels to Naples to extract Sasha from the city's demimonde and experiences an epiphany of his own while staring at a sculpture of Orpheus and Eurydice in the Museo Nazionale. We meet Bennie Salazar at the melancholy nadir of his adult life--divorced, struggling to connect with his nine-year-old son, listening to a washed-up band in the basement of a suburban house--and then revisit him in 1979, at the height of his youth, shy and tender, reveling in San Francisco's punk scene as he discovers his ardor for rock and roll and his gift for spotting talent. We learn what became of his high school gang--who thrived and who faltered--and we encounter Lou Kline, Bennie's catastrophically careless mentor, along with the lovers and children left behind in the wake of Lou's far-flung sexual conquests and meteoric rise and fall. A Visit from the Goon Squad is a book about the interplay of time and music, about survival, about the stirrings and transformations set inexorably in motion by even the most passing conjunction of our fates. In a breathtaking array of styles and tones ranging from tragedy to satire to PowerPoint, Egan captures the undertow of self-destruction that we all must either master or succumb to; the basic human hunger for redemption; and the universal tendency to reach for both--and escape the merciless progress of time--in the transporting realms of art and music. Sly, startling, exhilarating work from one of our boldest writers.
NATIONAL BESTSELLER National Book Critics Circle Award Winner PEN/Faulkner Award Finalist A New York Times Book Review Best Book One of the Best Books of the Year: Boston Globe, Chicago Tribune, The Daily Beast, The Miami Herald, The Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Newsday, NPR's On Point, O, the Oprah Magazine, People, Publishers Weekly, Salon, San Francisco Chronicle, Seattle Times, Slate, Time, The Washington Post, and Village Voice Bennie is an aging former punk rocker and record executive. Sasha is the passionate, troubled young woman he employs. Here Jennifer Egan brilliantly reveals their pasts, along with the inner lives of a host of other characters whose paths intersect with theirs. With music pulsing on every page, A Visit from the Goon Squad is a startling, exhilarating novel of self-destruction and redemption.
With music pulsing on every page, "A Visit from the Goon Squad" is a startling, exhilarating novel of self-destruction and redemption.
??itch perfect. . . . Darkly, rippingly funny. . . . Egan possesses a satirist?? eye and a romance novelist?? heart.??- The New York Times Book Review ??t once intellectually stimulating and moving. . . . Like a masterful album, this one demands a replay.??- The San Francisco Chronicle ?? new classic of American fiction.??- Time ??udacious, extraordinary.??- Philadelphia Inquirer ?? spiky, shape-shifting new book. . . . A display of Egan?? extreme virtuosity.??- The New York Times ??ildly ambitious. . . . A tour de force. . . . Music is both subject and metaphor as Egan explores the mutability of time, destiny, and individual accountability post-technology.??- O, The Oprah Magazine ??he smartest book you can get your hands on.??- Los Angeles Times ?? rich and unforgettable novel about decay and endurance, about individuals in a world as it changes around them. . . . [Daum] is one of the most talented writers today.??- The New York Review of Books ??t ends in the same place it starts, except that everything has changes, including you, the reader.??- The New Republic ??lever. Edgy. Groundbreaking. . . . Features characters about whom you come to care deeply as you watch them doing things they shouldn''t, acting gloriously, infuriatingly human.??- The Chicago Tribune ??gan?? bravura fifth book samples from different eras (the glory days of punk; a slick, socially networked future) and styles (sly satire, moving tragedy, even PowerPoint) to explore the interplay between music and the rough rhythms of life.??- Vogue ??old with both affection and intensity, Goon Squad stands as a brilliant, all-absorbing novel for the beach, the woods, the air-conditioned apartment or the city stoop while wearing your iPod. Stay with this one.??-Alan Cheuse, NPR?? All Things Considered ??rilliant, inventive. . . . Emboldening. It cracks the world open afresh. . . . Would that Marcel Proust could receive [a copy]. It would blow his considerable mind. . . . Expect to inhale Egan?? A Visit From the Goon Squad. Then expect it to lodge in your cranium and your breastbone a good long while.??- Cleveland Plain Dealer ??requently dazzling. . . . Egan?? expert flaying of human foibles has the compulsive allure of poking at a sore tooth: excruciating but exhilarating too.??- Entertainment Weekly ??f Egan is our reward for living through the self-conscious gimmicks and ironic claptrap of postmodernism, then it was all worthwhile. . . . [A] triumph of technical bravado and tender sympathy. . . . Turn up the music, skip the college reunion and curl up with The Goon Squad instead.??- The Washington Post ??A Visit From the Goon Squad should cement [Egan??] reputation as one of America?? best, and least predictable, literary novelists.??-Taylor Antrim, The Daily Beast ??rilliantly structured. . . . We are pulled right in. . . . [Egan is] a boldly intellectual writer who is not afraid to apply her equally powerful intuitive skills to her ambitious projects.??- Elle ??his is art at its best-as a bulwark against the goon, as it embodies everything at once.??- Austin American Statesman ??n exhilarating, big-hearted, three-headed beast of a story. . . . We see ourselves in all of Egan?? characters because their stories of heartbreak and redemption seem so real they could be our own, regardless of the soundtrack. Such is the stuff great novels are made of.??- Marie-Claire ??or all its postmodern flourishes, Goon Squad is as traditional as a Dickens novel. . . . [Egan??] aim is not so much to explode traditional storytelling as to explore how it responds to the pressures and opportunities of the digital age.??- Newsweek ??gan has accomplished the tricky feat of using metafiction techniques without sacrificing old-fashioned story-telling. . . . A Visit from the Goon Squad has a circuitous structure that seems almost designed for our Internet rewired brains.??- The Wall Street Journal
"Pitch perfect. . . . Darkly, rippingly funny. . . . Egan possesses a satirist's eye and a romance novelist's heart." - The New York Times Book Review "At once intellectually stimulating and moving. . . . Like a masterful album, this one demands a replay." - The San Francisco Chronicle "A new classic of American fiction." - Time "Audacious, extraordinary." - Philadelphia Inquirer "A spiky, shape-shifting new book. . . . A display of Egan's extreme virtuosity." - The New York Times "Wildly ambitious. . . . A tour de force. . . . Music is both subject and metaphor as Egan explores the mutability of time, destiny, and individual accountability post-technology." - O, The Oprah Magazine "The smartest book you can get your hands on." - Los Angeles Times "A rich and unforgettable novel about decay and endurance, about individuals in a world as it changes around them. . . . [Egan] is one of the most talented writers today." - The New York Review of Books "It ends in the same place it starts, except that everything has changes, including you, the reader." - The New Republic "Clever. Edgy. Groundbreaking. . . . Features characters about whom you come to care deeply as you watch them doing things they shouldn''t, acting gloriously, infuriatingly human." - The Chicago Tribune "Egan's bravura fifth book samples from different eras (the glory days of punk; a slick, socially networked future) and styles (sly satire, moving tragedy, even PowerPoint) to explore the interplay between music and the rough rhythms of life." - Vogue "Told with both affection and intensity, Goon Squadstands as a brilliant, all-absorbing novel for the beach, the woods, the air-conditioned apartment or the city stoop while wearing your iPod. Stay with this one." -Alan Cheuse, NPR's All Things Considered "Brilliant, inventive. . . . Emboldening. It cracks the world open afresh. . . . Would that Marcel Proust could receive [a copy]. It would blow his considerable mind. . . . Expect to inhale Egan's A Visit From the Goon Squad.Then expect it to lodge in your cranium and your breastbone a good long while." - Cleveland Plain Dealer "Frequently dazzling. . . . Egan's expert flaying of human foibles has the compulsive allure of poking at a sore tooth: excruciating but exhilarating too." - Entertainment Weekly "If Egan is our reward for living through the self-conscious gimmicks and ironic claptrap of postmodernism, then it was all worthwhile. . . . [A] triumph of technical bravado and tender sympathy. . . . Turn up the music, skip the college reunion and curl up with The Goon Squadinstead." - The Washington Post " A Visit From the Goon Squadshould cement [Egan's] reputation as one of America's best, and least predictable, literary novelists." -Taylor Antrim, The Daily Beast "Brilliantly structured. . . . We are pulled right in. . . . [Egan is] a boldly intellectual writer who is not afraid to apply her equally powerful intuitive skills to her ambitious projects." - Elle "This is art at its best-as a bulwark against the goon, as it embodies everything at once." - Austin American Statesman "An exhilarating, big-hearted, three-headed beast of a story. . . . We see ourselves in all of Egan's characters because their stories of heartbreak and redemption seem so real they could be our own, regardless of the soundtrack. Such is the stuff great novels are made of." - Marie-Claire "For all its postmodern flourishes, Goon Squadis as traditional as a Dickens novel. . . . [Egan's] aim is not so much to explode traditional storytelling as to explore how it responds to the pressures and opportunities of the digital age." - Newsweek "Egan has accomplished the tricky feat of using metafiction techniques without sacrificing old-fashioned story-telling. . . . A Visit from the Goon Squadhas a circuitous structure that seems almost designed for our Internet rewired brains." - The Wall Street Journal
"Pitch perfect. . . . Is there anything Egan can't do in this mash-up of forms? Write successfully in the second person? Check. Parody celebrity journalism and David Foster Wallace at the same time? Check. Make a moving narrative out of a PowerPoint presentation? Check. . . . Although shredded with loss,A Visit From the Goon Squadis often darkly, rippingly funny. Egan possesses a satirist's eye and a romance novelist's heart. . . . No one is beyond the pale of her affection; no one is spared lampooning. . . . For a book so relentlessly savvy about the digital age and its effect on how we experience time (speeded up, herky-jerky, instantaneous, but also full of unbearable gaps and pauses),A Visit From the Goon Squadis remarkably old-fashioned in its obsession with time's effects on characters, that preoccupation of those doorstop 19th-century novels." -Will Blythe,The New York Times Book Review(cover review) "If Jennifer Egan is our reward for living through the self-conscious gimmicks and ironic claptrap of postmodernism, then it was all worthwhile. . . . A deeply humane story about growing up and growing old in a culture corroded by technology and marketing. . . . [A] triumph of technical bravado and tender sympathy. . . . Here, in ways that surprise and delight again, she transcends slick boomer nostalgia and offers a testament to the redemptive power of raw emotion in an age of synthetic sound and glossy avatars. Turn up the music, skip the college reunion and curl up withThe Goon Squadinstead." -Ron Charles,The Washington Post "It may be the smartest book you can get your hands on this summer." -Carolyn Kellogg,The Los Angeles Times "[A] spiky, shape-shifting new book. . . . A display of Ms. Egan's extreme virtuosity." -Janet Maslin,The New York Times "Jennifer Egan is a rare bird: an experimental writer with a deep commitment to character, whose fiction is at once intellectually stimulating and moving. . . . It's a tricky book, but in the best way. When I got to the end, I wanted to start from the top again immediately, both to revisit the characters and to understand better how the pieces fit together. Like a masterful album, this one demands a replay." -Malena Watrous,The San Francisco Chronicle "For all its postmodern flourishes,Goon Squadis as traditional as a Dickens novel. . . . Her aim is not so much to explode traditional storytelling as to explore how it responds to the pressures and opportunities of the digital age. Egan herself does not appear to be on Facebook, butA Visit From the Goon Squadwill likely make her many new friends." -Jennie Yabroff,Newsweek "Jennifer Egan'sA Visit from the Goon Squadis a singular work of fiction in both senses of the word. It's as if the author has taken an epic novel covering five decades and expertly filleted it, casting aside excess characters and years to come away with a narrative that is wide-ranging but remarkably focused. . . . Vibrant and winning. . . . While this is occasionally a wistful book, it isn't' sad. Each narrative disorientation and subsequent reorientation reminds us of how we weave in and out of one another's lives, staying connected through memory-our shield against the goon squad. By the time we get to the last page of Egan's book . . . we're left wanting more." -Marty Pols,Time "Clever. Edgy. Groundbreaking. . . . For all of its cool, languid, arched-eyebrow sophistication-that's the part that will make you think 'Didion'-and for all of the glitteringly gorgeous sentences that flit through its pages like exotic fish-t
??itch perfect. . . . Is there anything Egan can?? do in this mash-up of forms? Write successfully in the second person? Check. Parody celebrity journalism and David Foster Wallace at the same time? Check. Make a moving narrative out of a PowerPoint presentation? Check. . . . Although shredded with loss, A Visit From the Goon Squadis often darkly, rippingly funny. Egan possesses a satirist?? eye and a romance novelist?? heart. . . . No one is beyond the pale of her affection; no one is spared lampooning. . . . For a book so relentlessly savvy about the digital age and its effect on how we experience time (speeded up, herky-jerky, instantaneous, but also full of unbearable gaps and pauses), A Visit From the Goon Squadis remarkably old-fashioned in its obsession with time?? effects on characters, that preoccupation of those doorstop 19th-century novels.??-Will Blythe, The New York Times Book Review(cover review) ??f Jennifer Egan is our reward for living through the self-conscious gimmicks and ironic claptrap of postmodernism, then it was all worthwhile. . . . A deeply humane story about growing up and growing old in a culture corroded by technology and marketing. . . . [A] triumph of technical bravado and tender sympathy. . . . Here, in ways that surprise and delight again, she transcends slick boomer nostalgia and offers a testament to the redemptive power of raw emotion in an age of synthetic sound and glossy avatars. Turn up the music, skip the college reunion and curl up with The Goon Squadinstead.??-Ron Charles, The Washington Post ??t may be the smartest book you can get your hands on this summer.??-Carolyn Kellogg, The Los Angeles Times ??A] spiky, shape-shifting new book. . . . A display of Ms. Egan?? extreme virtuosity.??-Janet Maslin, The New York Times ??ennifer Egan is a rare bird: an experimental writer with a deep commitment to character, whose fiction is at once intellectually stimulating and moving. . . . It?? a tricky book, but in the best way. When I got to the end, I wanted to start from the top again immediately, both to revisit the characters and to understand better how the pieces fit together. Like a masterful album, this one demands a replay.??-Malena Watrous, The San Francisco Chronicle ??or all its postmodern flourishes, Goon Squadis as traditional as a Dickens novel. . . . Her aim is not so much to explode traditional storytelling as to explore how it responds to the pressures and opportunities of the digital age. Egan herself does not appear to be on Facebook, but A Visit From the Goon Squadwill likely make her many new friends.??-Jennie Yabroff, Newsweek ??ennifer Egan?? A Visit from the Goon Squadis a singular work of fiction in both senses of the word. It?? as if the author has taken an epic novel covering five decades and expertly filleted it, casting aside excess characters and years to come away with a narrative that is wide-ranging but remarkably focused. . . . Vibrant and winning. . . . While this is occasionally a wistful book, it isn????sad. Each narrative disorientation and subsequent reorientation reminds us of how we weave in and out of one another?? lives, staying connected through memory-our shield against the goon squad. By the time we get to the last page of Egan?? book . . . we??e left wanting more.??-Marty Pols, Time ??lever. Edgy. Groundbreaking. . . . For all of its cool, languid, arched-eyebrow sophistication-that?? the part that will make you think ??idion??and for all of the glitteringly gorgeous sentences that flit through its pages like exotic fish-that?? the DeLillo part-the novel is actually a sturdy, robust, old-fashioned affair. It features characters about whom you come to care deeply as you watch them doing things they shouldn''t, acting gloriously, infuriatingly human.??-Julia Keller, The Chicago Tribune ??ennifer Egan has accomplished the tricky feat of using metafiction techniques without sacrificing old-fashioned story-telling. . . . A Visit from the Goon Squadhas a circuitous structure that seems almost designed for our Internet rewired brains.??-Steven Kurutz, The Wall Street Journal ??xpect to inhale Jennifer Egan?? A Visit From the Goon Squad.Then expect it to lodge in your cranium and your breastbone a good long while. I expect this brilliant, inventive novel to become enshrined. Such rash speculation is foolish, I know-we live amid a plague of bloated praise. But A Visit From the Goon Squadis emboldening. It cracks the world open afresh . . . Would that Marcel Proust could receive A Visit From the Goon Squad.It would blow his considerable mind.??-Karen R. Long, Cleveland Plain Dealer ??xpect to inhale Jennifer Egan?? A Visit From the Goon Squad.Then expect it to lodge in your cranium and your breastbone a good long while. I expect this brilliant, inventive novel to become enshrined. Such rash speculation is foolish, I know-we live amid a plague of bloated praise. But A Visit From the Goon Squadis emboldening. It cracks the world open afresh . . . Would that Marcel Proust could receive A Visit From the Goon Squad.It would blow his considerable mind.??-Karen R. Long, Cleveland Plain Dealer ??n her audacious, extraordinary fourth novel, A Visit from the Goon Squad, Jennifer Egan uses the pop-music business as a prism to examine the heedless pace of modern life, generational impasses, and the awful gravity of age and entropy. . . . A Visit from the Goon Squadis fascinating for its daring scope and fractured narrative, but along the way, Egan crafts some brilliant scenes. . . . A rich and rewarding novel.??-David Hiltbrand, Philadelphia Inquierer ??rounded in the passions and frustrations of a record producer and his nervy assistant, Jennifer Egan?? bravura fifth book, A Visit from the Goon Squad,samples from different eras (the glory days of punk; a slick, socially networked future) and styles (sly satire, moving tragedy, even PowerPoint) to explore the interplay between music and the rough rhythms of life.??-Megan O??rady, Vogue ??ildly ambitious. . . . A tour de force. . . . Music is both subject and metaphor as Egan explores the mutability of time, destiny, and individual accountability post-technology.??-Liza Nelson, O, The Oprah Magazine ??A Visit from the Goon Squad[is] an exhilarating, big-hearted, three-headed beast of a story. . . . [A] genius as a writer. . . . We see ourselves in all of Egan?? characters because their stories of heartbreak and redemption seem so real they could be our own, regardless of the soundtrack. Such is the stuff great novels are made of.??-Kimberly Cutter, Marie-Claire ??Egan is] a boldly intellectual writer who is not afraid to apply her equally powerful intuitive skills to her ambitious projects. . . . While it?? a time-trekking, tech-freakin??doozie, the characters??lives and fates claim the story first and foremost, and we are pulled right in. . . . Brilliantly structured, with storylike chapters.??-Lisa Shea, Elle ??A] slamming multi-generational San Francisco family saga.??-Elissa Schappell, Vanity Fair ??requently dazzling. . . . Egan?? expert flaying of human foibles has the compulsive allure of poking at a sore tooth: excruciating but e