54 of 60 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
A good read, but ultimately it falls a little flat, November 4, 2004
This review is from: The Inner Circle (Hardcover)
I look forward to each new novel by T.C. Boyle with great anticipation; he's a gadfly, an iconoclast who can weave a fascinating web of words filled with twists and turns and verbal pyrotechnics. He can be impishly cynical toward social idealism of all types, as clearly expressed in *The Tortilla Curtain* and *Drop City*, but he also can show a softer, more sympathetic side, as demonstrated in what I consider his finest novel overall, *Riven Rock*.
As always, Boyle has created a novel that's at the very least, a good read. I devoured this book, cover to cover, almost without stopping, which is a testament to Boyle's ability to write lucid, entertaining prose. There is a noticeably a less manic feel to his writing this time around, however, and it's unclear to me whether this was a deliberate strategy, based on the sensitive nature of his subject matter, or whether instead Boyle found his inspiration just a bit lacking.
The fact that *The Inner Circle* deals with Alfred Kinsey and his pioneering work on sex research certainly makes the novel all the more alluring and addictive, I confess. Assuming that Boyle has taken only minor liberties with the actual historical characters of Kinsey and his wife Clara, the book illuminates in excellent fashion the motives, mindset, and methods behind Kinsey's single-minded pursuit of his research. Boyle does (apparently) a fine job of depicting the character and personality of Kinsey, albeit from the virtually uncritical perspective of his narrator, the mild-mannered fictional research assistant, John Milk.
Frankly, to me the larger-than-life, hard-charging Kinsey comes across not as a "great man of learning," but instead as something of a lunatic, almost a monster, a man with clear psychological pathologies that drive him to pursue his sexual research in a fanatical, single-minded fashion. His research programme seemed to be based on the (to me) absurd proposition that humans are, after all, just like other animals in our basic sexual drive and its various forms of expression except that "society" "interferes." To me, this perspective is based on a fundamentally flawed conception of human nature, one in which an essential animalistic human core is simply overlain with "socialization" and its attendant hangups. No; more accurately, human beings' most "animalistic" tendencies and behaviors are permeated through and through by culture, and so to try to strip away "socialization" to get at the "raw sexuality" is a project that is doomed not only to fail, but to distort badly the actual nature of human sexuality.
That Professor Kinsey ("Prok") expects his researchers (and their wives!) to drop all emotional associations with their sexuality to the point of partaking in ghastly quasi-public sexual performances reveals not a thoughtful scientific perspective tempered by empathy with his human subjects, but the fanaticism of a veritable sociopath, a bully, a proverbial control freak. If this, in fact, is Boyle's intention in his depiction of Kinsey, he succeeds brilliantly.
However, what I found disappointing is that all other characters in the book, including Milk himself, come across as flat, shallow, and unmemorable. By the end of the book the reader knows very little about the inner life and motivations of these people, even as the depths of their sexual lives are plumbed and chronicled, page after page. What struck me as particularly wanting was Boyle's portrayal of the motives and mindset behind the "low level" homosexual inclinations of Kinsey, Milk, and the other male assistants. Somehow, the way this activity (called "H-behavior") unfolds and the way that Milk, at least, experiences this doesn't ring true, and ultimately falls flat.
Furthermore, despite the often-fascinating passages dealing with the evolution of the Kinsey project, the interactions between Prok, Milk, Clara Kinsey ("Mac"), Milk's wife, Iris, and the rest of the principal characters, ultimately as a *story* the book moves along rather turgidly much of the time, and ultimately it doesn't really go very far. The climactic scene, centering around conflicts related to Kinsey's megalomaniacal demands related to coerced public sexual performances by his assistants and their wives, is largely much ado about very little. Then, shortly thereafter, the book just kind of ends. I found this a bit disappointing.
Overall, this is not Boyle's best effort, but he's such a talented writer that even a near-miss by Boyle is likely to be better than the best writing of most other contemporary novelists. If you've enjoyed his previous books or if you simply suspect that the Kinsey project makes for one heckuva fine subject for a novel, you probably will find *The Inner Circle* a satisfying read.
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33 of 36 people found the following review helpful:
2.0 out of 5 stars
A great idea for a book, but not fully realized., October 10, 2004
This review is from: The Inner Circle (Hardcover)
I bought this book the day it came out, both because I had liked "Drop City" so well, and because, hey, a book about Kinsey and sex has to be somewhat interesting. I came away a bit disappointed. This book lacked a real focus. There were moments where this book seemed to make sense and actually managed to be enjoyable, but must of the time, it was rather cold and unlikable.
The character of Kinsey himself ("Prok") was far too flat. It was not clear to me what it was about him that drew his followers so deeply into his inner circle. For the same reasons, I disliked the protagonist, John Milk. Why he followed Kinsey so blindly at the expense of his marriage and happiness is a mystery. The book followed him through his emotional turmoil in a cyclical fashion, with the plot rehashing itself repeatedly with no growth on the part of any characters, with the exception perhaps of Iris, Milk's wife. But Boyle leaves her in the background, definitely a shame.
The plot of this book had promise. Kinsey was a fascinating man, and he conducted fascinating research. But Boyle describes the research and the accompanying sexual exploits in either an illusory manner (when it is homosexual sex being discussed, or 'H-behavior') or in a way that is far too medical and sterile to be anything but uncomfortable and boring.
Overall, I didn't dislike this book, I just kind of felt like I was reading to finish, instead of for the joy of the book. It's not a bad book, it's just nota very good one. Read "Drop City" instead to see what Boyle is really capable of.
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17 of 17 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
1+1=3, May 11, 2005
This review is from: The Inner Circle (Hardcover)
Having seen the film, "Kinsey" before I began to read T.C. Boyle's "The Inner Circle" really helped me to fill in the visual component of Boyle's always fat and juicy prose.
Using the docu-fiction form, Boyle riffs on certain known facts of Kinsey's time at IU, his groundbreaking research and uses John Milk as his vehicle into that particular world that Kinsey created during his tenure at Indiana University as a professor of Biology and more importantly as a sex researcher and author.
Boyle writes of Milk's entrance into Kinsey-land: "That was the moment it all began, though I didn't realize it at the time...how could I? How could I have foreseen that a shallow, manipulative girl I hardly knew would be the motive force that was to lead me to Prok (Kinsey) and Mac (Kinsey's wife), Corcoran, Rutledge, to the desk at which I am now sitting..."
Boyle paints Kinsey as a kind of Machiavellian, all-knowing leader of his group of researchers and their families: "What he (Kinsey) wanted above all else was to gain the sort of intimacy that yields up confidences, and he had a true genius for it---for putting people at ease and bringing them out. Absent it, the project would have never gotten off the ground."
Kinsey is a warm, loving person who, as long as you do as he advises, would do anything for you. When Milk's wife, Iris has an affair with another researcher ("I knew why she'd done what she had...she'd had one man in her life, just one and I'd had Mac and Prok...") Kinsey at first is happy that she has acted out her fantasy. But when Iris decides to leave Milk and live with her lover, John... Kinsey intercedes and the whole situation is diffused. In fact in a scene very much like one between a father and son or a King and his Page, Milk goes to Kinsey not only for consolation and advice but for action and interference: "...I love him (Kinsey)...not in the way I love Iris...but in a deeper way, in the way a patriot loves his country or a zealot his God..."
"The Inner Circle" is an intriguing read: it is beautifully written as befits a T.C. Boyle book but it is also a strongly, no-holds-barred sexual book as befits it's subject. Don't come to Kinsey-land expecting a bland re-telling of the Alfred Kinsey life story, because you won't find it. What you will find is a passionately thoughtful novel written by one of our major contemporary novelists at the top of his form.
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