Customer Reviews

Reproduction is the Flaw of Love (Delta Fiction)

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I really can't say enough about this excellent, assured first novel. The story of a young man - Miller - in the longest hours of his life, Lauren Grodstein's "Reproduction is the Flaw of Love" treats issues of love and family with a deft touch, and a real feel for narrative. While Miller waits for the results of his girlfriend's pregnancy test, Grodstein moves seamlessly back-and-forth between his present agony, and the events leading up to it.

From a purely prosaic standpoint, the novel is a textbook example of how to perform one of the most difficult tricks in storytelling: the framing sequence. Grodstein does it by firmly grounding Miller's present troubles, and declining the temptation to gild the memories of his troubled family or his enigmatic ex-girlfriend.

It's a wonderful performance, moving and finely crafted. You should read it.

This review is for Dial Press hardcover edition, July 2004, 211 pages. REPRODUCTION IS THE FLAW OF LOVE is Lauren Grodstein's debut novel.

Joel Miller, most everyone refers to him as Miller, will be 29 next month. As the story opens, Miller waits outside the bathroom door in an apartment in Park Slope, Manhattan, while his girlfriend, Lisa, procrastinates over taking a pregnancy test. The reader correctly assumes that the author will not reveal Lisa's condition until the end of the novel. Meantime, this third person narrative explores Miller's back story from his point of view. We meet his mother Bay and his father Stan, his best friend Grant and his ex girlfriend Blair who, so far, is the love of Miller's life. His story is interesting and the reader learns what to expect of him if the test is positive.

The acknowledgments page begins with, "Thanks to Elliot Grodstein, for teaching me what I needed to know about how a guy's mind works..." Elliot did a good job. Grodstein's male characters deal with angst and anxiety as men are apt to do. Her female characters are as men perceive women, enigmas. The story is enlightening, even for a guy.

Reproduction Is The Flaw Of Love is a wonderfully ironic title for a novel precisely because reproduction is, in fact, the point of love. At least biologically speaking. But what draws couples together mostly defies facile categorization and it is the nuances of attraction (and the loss of interest in the beloved over time) that Lauren Grodstein understands so well. That Grodstein wrote this exegesis of lust and longing from the male perspective, and so convincingly, I found truly impressive. In particular, she does justice to the way men experience falling in love and the exquisite vulnerability they may feel once love has taken root. Structurally, the narrative of this cleverly written, entertaining novel has the feel of a series of interconnected short stories which revolve around a protagonist, Miller, who is seen coping with male-female issues at a number of stages of his life. Some segments work better than others but I always have trouble when authors try to accomplish a bit too much with their work. This minor criticism notwithstanding, I thoroughly enjoyed Reproduction Is The Flaw Of Love which I devoured greedily in just a few sittings. I hope that men especially get the opportunity to read it as this novel's honest portrayal of our way of responding to the throws of painful romance holds the promise of opening up a topic or two for much needed consideration.

The story starts off in the present Miller waiting for the results of the pregnancy testby his girlfriend. It takes the whole book before we find out the results.That in itself is not the problem with the story. The author jumps all over the place with his memories of his life up to now. Some parts interesting other rather dull and average.

I bought this story on the Amazon ratings and feel I have been dudded. It is definately not a 4 & 1/2 star story. 3 star at the best.

It an average read nothing new out of the bag to rave about. Great try for a first book for the author. His next few hopefully will be more fast pace and more gripping.

I wish the author well.

Try this story but its really a 3 star average read.

To say this novel is simple is reductive...and yet it is simple. Simple in premise "man goes out for a pregnancy test" simple, but so layered in meaning and raw existential thought that you can't help but think of Proust's Remembrance of things past..."man eats a piece of cake."

And yet Reproduction reminds me (thankfully!) more of Hornby's High Fidelity than of Proust, The way that Grodstein grabs on to the reader from the beginning, and sends us down a path of remembrance.,,particularly sexual remembrance,,,it has Hornby's edginess with just hints of language that in this day even Proust might've been proud of.

The only problem I see with the novel is that with our deep investment in the radiant players we get to the end confused about what we think is the solution,,,what should we want to happen,,,do we want her to be preganant? Do we want Miller to want chocolate again? Or will he setlle for bread, And if bread has a baby, what would those little tiny muffins taste like? Would you taste the muffins at all, or would you just have to live with all of them in the hell of a single kitchen (sans granite counter-top upgrades) you can barely afford?

Grodstein;s novel ultimately asks the single most important question you can ask in a relationship,,,can circumstance govern your life? Should it? Or can you break free from what you;ve done if you feel it is going to change the course of your life entirely,

And when she gives her answer, you get the greatest suprise of all: surprise that makes sense given the context,,,,not suprise for it;s own sake, but because of what it drives the rich, deep, characters to do, chose, feel,

Abnd THAT is how you write a bestseller. Forget the Da Vinci Code or The Rule of Four...with their endless intellectual brain teasers, just wanting for something more, This one's the one to watch,,,only one puzzle...is she or isn;t she, and it keeps you captivated from page one,

Grodstein's debut novel opens with a scene in which 28-year-old Joel's girlfriend Lisa is taking a pregnancy test. At first glance, the book appears to be about the upcoming life decisions Lisa and Joel (who aren't exactly excited about marriage) are going to have to make. Grodstein quickly whisks the reader away, however, into Joel's past, into the history of this man and the relationships that shaped him so that he arrived at this scene on a weekend afternoon fretting about pregnancy.

As we learn about Joel's past, we're introduced to his parents, Bay and Stan, and to the amazing but permanently scarring Blair Carter. The more I read about the rich fabric from which Joel's being was woven, I hoped this book would not be about his upcoming parenthood with the unavailable, bland, broken-legged Lisa. I'll leave the reader to find out what it is about in their mind, but it was a quick and delicious read for me.

but like a lot of NY-centered books, think a lot of flavor will be lost to non-NY'rs.

Writing is OK but not terribly memorable. In fact I was about ready to put it down because of the constant narrative being interrupted with backstory. Learned to get over the device, but not the rather shallow characters. Could be the writer really wanted to "get into the way a guy really thinks"" and I am just too impatient with the character's maturity to become interested enough to really care.

I got the book in one of the Amazon special-$5 deals and I don't regret it. I read A LOT and usually select from prize-winning books by running through Border's and picking up what I have listed from reviews and what I find on the shelves that seem likely to interest me. (almost everything, it seems.) Don't think I would have picked this up. Just too young for me, altho it did make me homesick for the daily life in the city.

I am so glad I bought this book. Ms. Grodstein has achieved a wonderful balance between bittersweet and humorous. I immediately identified with the protagonist, despite the fact that he is male and I am female, and quickly began to care about him. I also commend Ms. Grodstein for the clever structuring of the story, interweaving the past and the present. Many authors try this method and it often winds up feeling clunky or simply confusing.

It's nice to see a book about people in their early 30's that isn't chick lit or gossip lit. I look forward to the next effort from this talented writer.

This book, about a guy named Miller who reflects on his life and loves while his girlfriend waits for the results of a pregnancy test, has a catchy title. But to assume that it's about how the prospect of parenthood spoils all the fun of a relationship would be to trivialize it.

Try this: the characters in this book - all of whom presumably were conceived in a moment that someone would describe as "love," are what's flawed. But then, aren't we all? And that's what makes this book so engrossing: because it's filled with real people experiencing the poignancy of ordinary existence.

There are many books that thrill us with people and events way outside our frame of reference. This book moves us precisely because it has the ability to evoke in us real thoughts and emotions to which we can relate. And because, in the end, each of us knows that the ultimate adventure is life itself.

Excellent! Lauren Grodstein digs deep into the interworkings of the male mind. The author masterfully articulates the affects of dysfunctional childhoood and adolescence experiences on one's thoughts and behavior throughout adulthood.