Stream of consciousness makes my head hurt, even when my heart is totally involved. ( )

Mostly disappointing memoir/novel that is really neither, since Dufresne won't commit himself to a story of his own past. Only novels contain truth, he says, and memoirs are a pack of lies. Perhaps, or perhaps that's just a neat excuse. Whatever the case, the book as a book (of whatever sort) just barely held my attention. Not his best effort. I loved Deep in the Shade of Paradise. ( )

Dufresne creates a family that is all at once Agee, Burroughs and Sedaris. Johnny's family redefines "function" in dysfunctionality, and the book will make you laugh, shudder with recognition, and wallow in the mire of human experience. ( )

First of all, the parts at the beginning of this book, where the narrator is discussing whether to write a memoir or not? Are maybe not as much fiction as you might understandably think, if you are not from Worcester, Mass., the more or less completely undisguised antecedent of the city of Requiem. (Sometimes the names are changed, but so much more often they're just not.)

Requiem is a darkly hilarious tale of a family totally unable to hold onto itself, together or separately, in any sense of the phrase. I love Dufresne's style and writing, and I'm especially fond of his other work, but this was really, really hard to read. The city he describes is the city of my birth, and his too; my parents are his contemporaries. If you're from Worcester, particularly if you grew up there in the fifties and sixties, you will read this book terrified you'll turn a page and run up against someone you know or are related to. If you grew up there in the seventies or eighties, you'll turn the pages afraid you'll see your parents.

AND YOU MIGHT. You really, really might. It's terrifying. But if you're from there you really, really have to read it anyway. And then you will probably want to make everyone else you know from there read it too. I made my mom and her sister read it. Her sister found a co-worker. My mom found some of her dad's cousins. My parents passed it on to everyone they could think of from their old neighborhood. It's like watching a train wreck - you can't look away - but it is also awesome.

If you are not from there, I can't help you. I loved the book, but I cannot imagine what the experience of reading it without an intimate knowledge of the city is like. ( )

I enjoyed this pretty thoroughly. Great mix of quirky and dark. The ending was somewhat unsatisfying and yet it suited the book so well, it was difficult to wish it had ended otherwise. This was the first book I have read by Mr. Dufresne and I am definitely interested in reading more. ( )