Customer Reviews

When We Were Bad

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

 

 

SPOILER ALERT

This book is well written, and at times amusing, but quite exasperating in its depiction of the Rubin family. I disliked half the characters, and the least likable ones were so broadly drawn as to be unbelievable (e.g., a 27 year old woman in so many words telling her brother, who wants to live with his lover, "How could you? We all have to sacrifice our lives for mum's sake!"). As a therapist I found the level of family dysfunction and enmeshment not very funny at all. Was it supposed to be endearing, despite its quirks? Well, it wasn't!

Three stars for readability, and for giving us two characters who escaped (more or less).

Have just finished reading When We Were Bad and found the story very entertaining and humorous. Great depiction of a family who appears to be "the perfect family" to outsiders, but when we see the family from the inside, is just as dysfunctional as many of us. Very clever writing.

Would recommend this book - definitely.

This book is not easy to characterize, and that is one of its strong points. It is the story of a dominating woman, her children and her husband who have all suffered from this domination, but it is also what I call a feel good story, thanks to its outcomes; it is also a social satire and even a comedy. Francis at one point is behaving strangely, but she is only dimly aware of this, "no more than of the thick gray dust crushed beneath the wheels (of the train), the gray mice trembling against the track as the train races past into darkness". Mendelsohn is not a particularly good prose stylist, but the quoted material is from an author who sometimes expects her readers to laugh with her at her characters and their weaknesses and situations.

The dominating woman is a Rabbi, and her professional life certainly adds interest to the story, though theology plays no real role. I think Mendelsohn goes a little overboard with the 2 younger children, and I think an editor could have eliminated Simeon with good effect.

Oh dear, I seem to have been unlucky with my choice of books again ("I'll go to bed at noon" was the previous one). This book left me thinking, "what was the point of that?". The characters were stereotypes, the language wooden, the situations banal. I should confess I am not Jewish; would that have made a difference, I wonder? It shouldn't, should it, if a book is well written? Anyway, NOT recommended.

The reviews all rave about how funny this book is- they're lying. It's not funny at all. I've got a fairly well-developed sense of humour, but I found the story so painful it made me flinch; the characters are all so flawed and easily identified with that I wanted to chuck the book across the room and yell at them for all their obviously idiotic behaviour.

It was a wonderful read.

The Los Angeles Times called WHEN WE WERE BAD, "Charlotte Mendelson's immensely funny and affecting third novel...an elegant comedy of longing and survival" And the Boston Globe called raved, "a witty, insightful, elegantly written novel about family....[Mendelson is] a wonderful writer, economical, inventive, and, when appropriate, lyrical."

I couldn't agree more with both reviews - WHEN WE WERE BAD is a joy to read, a vibrant, smashing, compelling novel that carries you into the life of a fascinating family.