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Search - Middlesex
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Book Description:
"I was born twice: first, as a baby girl, on a remarkably smogless Detroit day of January 1960; and then again, as a teenage boy, in an emergency room near Petoskey, Michigan, in August of l974. . . My birth certificate lists my name as Calliope Helen Stephanides. My most recent drivers license...records my first name simply as Cal."Members who requested this book also requested:
So begins the breathtaking story of Calliope Stephanides and three generations of the Greek-American Stephanides family who travel from a tiny village overlooking Mount Olympus in Asia Minor to Prohibition-era Detroit, witnessing its glory days as the Motor City, and the race riots of l967, before they move out to the tree-lined streets of suburban Grosse Pointe, Michigan. To understand why Calliope is not like other girls, she has to uncover a guilty family secret and the astonishing genetic history that turns Callie into Cal, one of the most audacious and wondrous narrators in contemporary fiction. Lyrical and thrilling, Middlesex is an exhilarating reinvention of the American epic.
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Genres:Other Versions of this Book: Hardcover, Hardcover, Audio Cassette (Unabridged), Audio CD (Abridged), Audio CD (Unabridged)
Top Member Reviews
Leigh P. (
27 member(s) found this review helpful.
Entirely too long, entirely too much backstory, and entirely undeserving of the Pulitzer Prize. Eudenides spends 3/4 of the book describing in great lengths an episodic history for all of the characters told from the point of view of a narrator who could not possibly know the level of detail he/she is giving.
The last 1/4 of the book is amazingly well-done, with flowing and informative prose, as well as giving the reader a plethora of medical information. I truly felt as if I was in the head of a hermaphrodite. The author excels at this. However, it reads incredibly slow, so only pick it up if you've got some time on your hands.
It's worth the read if you're either perseverant and don't mind a dense, background-heavy story, or if you're like me and are trying to read the Pulitzers.
Amanda A. (
15 member(s) found this review helpful.
Wonderful! Happy to see gender issues in main-stream literature! Though the book begins with a slower pace as the reader learns the rich history of Cal's grandparents, the second half of the novel flashs by with his personal story.
I loved the novel and wished it kept going... I didn't want to finish it knowing the story would be over. The reader is always aware of two time periods: the present Cal telling the story and his life unfolding during narration and, in the beginning the story of his family, while later in the novel the second time period is Cal's childhood.
I recommend this book if you have the time to devote to reading it, the intellegence to comprehend the wonderful literary techniques and vocabulary, and the trust in the author to deliver a brilliant story. Lastly, anyone studying sex and gender issues would thrill to read the second half, as a thorough workover of sociological nomemclature is utilized.
11 member(s) found this review helpful.
Fantastic book. It may take you a bit to get into the story - the author's style is unusual and the start of the book takes you into a foreign land. Beautifully crafted novel that will have you thinking about the story for days after.
11 member(s) found this review helpful.
Cal has lived a life in two genders. Raised as a girl, he eventually discovers that he is a hermaphrodite, a person born with both male and female organs. But the story doesn't start here. To discover why Cal is the person he is, we have to go back in time to his grandparents in Greece, then to his parent's relationship, and finally back to Cal's life story as a little girl who found her life dramatically changing once she hit puberty. Middlesex is a wonderfully written novel about a controversial subject. In many ways, it is an epic. By the end of the novel, you will find yourself changed by the story of a little girl who grew up to discover that she was something else.
A. J. C. (
9 member(s) found this review helpful.
I really liked this book. I'm a fan of long family dramas spanning multiple generations, but I've never read a book about a hermaphrodite before. There were a few parts in the story that I found a bit outlandish, the silk-worming in Detroit, for instance, with the cult-leader who ended up being none other than... (don't want to spoil it), the freak show incident in San Francisco, and the dramatic car chase at the end, just to name a few, great book regardless! I enjoyed the novel's focus on genetics. The sperm as narrator was brilliant, don't want to give too much away. I highly recommend this book, original!
Michele W. (
8 member(s) found this review helpful.
I thought this was a gripping story of the Stephanides family from Greece to Detroit. With all of the detail spent on the grandparents' and parents' stories, I wish more time had been devoted to Cal. I will recommend it to my bookclub; but many will find it too long to read.
7 member(s) found this review helpful.
I read this book in a book club long before Oprah found it and don't know why she hyped it up so much. I'm open to reading about pretty much anything, but just could not get into this book and was kind of irritated with it. That's just my opinion, but I thought I'd share it.
7 member(s) found this review helpful.
One of the best I've read this year. There's a lot of backstory and character development but that's why I love it. A really fascinating look at an original subject.
Highly recommended
6 member(s) found this review helpful.
I LOVED THIS BOOK!! That being said, my best friend is trodding through it begrudgingly. For me it was one of my top 10 books I have ever read, I really enjoyed it, from beginning to end, I did not want to put it down. Several of my book club members told me they did not enjoy the beginning but liked it better once it got further along.
6 member(s) found this review helpful.
Bizarre but worth reading. It's like a train wreck from which you cannot look away. The whole gender identity question is souch a loaded subject and the author makes it very personal.
Rate These Member Reviews
A Pulitzer-prize winning novel - really good.
It's an extremely realistic, insightful novel about a hermaphrodite. It starts out with the narrator's grandparents emigrating to the US from Greece after the Turkish invasion, and has a lot to do with The Immigrant Experience (reminding me at times of 'The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Klay'), and continues on through the narrators birth, being raised as a normal girl, falling in love with 'her' best friend, realizing at puberty that something was not right - being taken to an expert, threatened with a mutilating operation, running away, working in a freak show in San Francisco, and eventually finding a successful life and hope for a real relationship in Berlin...
Those details don't really give anything away, because the book is all about the experience and the emotions, about family, tragedy, relationships, revelations and hope. Highly recommended.
Jennifer C. from ATLANTA, GA wrote on 6/10/2008...I thought this would potentially be a sordid, unpleasant read. But it was really interesting and I thoroughly enjoyed the family history in the story that brings us up to the present day narrator. It covered a lot of ground, but smoothly. Also, he uses a lot of color and metaphor, but it's engaging as opposed to burdensome.
Very much enjoyed this book. Interesting topic, well developed.
Wendy F. from BRANDON, VT wrote on 2/27/2008...What a great read! A fascinating look at one family and their long held secret.
EXCELLENT book. Based in Detroit, which is my home town. In addition, it is just a wonderful and compelling story about a genetic condition most of us don't know anything about.
starts out slow then gets very wierd and more interesting....
Lissette H. (I really enjoyed this novel! One of my favorite books read in 2006.
Christina P. from EAST FALMOUTH, MA wrote on 4/11/2007...a very twisted tail of a boy/girl... very good read
BRUCE R. from ST SIMONS IS, GA wrote on 3/13/2007...good
Kathy M. from NEWTOWN, CT wrote on 3/3/2007...Good story line. Well written. I enjoyed this book