#4: The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

The Pulitzer Prize winning novel The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao follows the life of a nerdy young man living in New York. Oscar is a comic book-loving overweight kid who is obsessed with girls, but lacks any kind of social skills to actually form a relationship. Even worse, he is of Dominican heritage, and has a reputation to live up to. Also, his family is haunted by a fukú, or curse, resulting from his mother's interactions with the former dictator of the Dominican Republic. The narration is done by different characters in different parts, including Oscar's college roommate Yunior and his sister Lola.

Oscar Wao was a very frustrating book for me to read due to its uneven pacing. While some parts were very interesting, others seemed to drag on forever. As I was reading, I looked up some reviews to determine whether it would get better, and one said that the action picked up after page 150, which was true. However, from about page 75 to page 150, I had to struggle to push myself through.

Another thing that hindered my enjoyment of the book was the pervasive inclusion of Spanish phrases, especially slang. I am far from fluent in Spanish, but have some basic competence; however, many phrases were outside my level of comprehension. As I did not feel like sitting at my computer looking up phrases while I was reading, I just did the best I could within the context of the story.

The part of the story I enjoyed the most was the section about Oscar's mother, Belicia, during her youth. First and foremost, it was very interesting to read about the Dominican history that was the backdrop to her youth. I had no idea of the atrocities committed by their dictator, Trujillo. I also enjoyed the descriptions of the island, as I knew little about it except its history as a hotbed for producing Major League Baseball players.

The other thing I enjoyed about the story was the characters. While the plot sometimes seemed muddled, the characters were very distinctive. Oscar's mother was very negative, and her history explained why she ended up this way. Her two kids, Lola and Oscar, were opposites of each other, but were able to develop a strong bond. I wanted to follow these characters, but would have preferred to do so in an easier to digest manner.

Rating: *** out of *****