Chicago Loop [Hardcover]

Paul Theroux (Author)

Product Details

• Hardcover
• Publisher: Random House Trade; 1st U. S. edition (March 1991)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0685390160
• ISBN-13: 978-0685390160
• Average Customer Review: 3.1 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)

More About the Author

Paul Theroux's highly acclaimed novels include Blinding Light, Hotel Honolulu, My Other Life, Kowloon Tong, and The Mosquito Coast. His renowned travel books include Ghost Train to the Eastern Star, Dark Star Safari, Riding the Iron Rooster, The Great Railway Bazaar, The Old Patagonian Express, and The Happy Isles of Oceania. He lives in Hawaii and on Cape Cod.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A Better Map of Inner Landscape Than Outer, August 13, 2002

By 

Nicholas Watters "Nick Watters" (Chicago, IL United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Chicago Loop (Hardcover)

I have been transported by Theroux's fiction, especially his Collected Stories and My Other Life. But this book has problems. As an exploration of the anguish of a man trying to face the innate aggression of male sexuality, it sometimes succeeds. But the main character does not cohere, and his psychosis is no excuse for the author's failure. It reads as though the character had been rewritten at least twice, but was never integrated.
There are also problems with the setting. It might seem petty and provincial to quibble about details of local color, but Theroux is after all a famous travel writer. The neighborhoods and buildings depicted exist, but the businesses and people he describes would never occupy them. A Polish-American woman says she is from "Milwaukee Avenue," which would be like a New Yorker saying he came from "Third Avenue." Most unforgiveably, she puts ketchup on her sausage. This horrifying lapse makes me wonder whether he visited Chicago at all, or just referred at a map.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Over the top but highly readable, July 2, 2008

By 

James Manheim (Ann Arbor, MI, USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Chicago Loop (Spanish Edition) (Paperback)

Seeing the highly positive and negative reviews here I have to offer a mixed opinion. This is definitely on the very dark side, and at times it seems so disconnected from reality that you have to ask what the point is. But it's beautifully written, and if you're the type who doesn't ask that fiction be hunky-dory it's quite readable. I took it on vacation, which may seem perverse, but it's a page-turner in its way. It features what may be the kinkiest marriage in the history of literature. The book is a period piece from the late 1980s with effective use of icons of that time such as Robert Mapplethorpe's photography.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Dark, October 5, 2003

By 

frk040 (NYNY) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Chicago Loop (Paperback)

Having read Chicago Loop a few years ago, I felt compelled to offer my 2 cents due to the overly negative reviews posted here. It is a very good book by a great author, dealing with sexual desires and thoughts that some might find disturbing. I get the idea that this is what the author intended, and the hellish ride through the main character's psyche as he descends into the depths of despair and depravity is a hell of a good read.