The Marriage Plot by Jeffrey Eugenides

Oh Mr Eugenides, you make me swoon with your literary smarts; your witty pop-culture references; your cliché-free relationship observations and your general cleverness. Now might not be the time to tell you that I never read The Virgin Suicides I thought maybe the praise was just a tad over the top. But you’ve really got me with this one.

Leonard. Never has a character with such an unsexy name been so captivating. Immeasurably flawed, hilariously depressed, unaccountable for his dastardly actions and constantly over-worked brain, he is one of modern literature’s most brightly coloured protaganists. He made me laugh out loud and cringe inwardly with every awkward incident. His long-suffering girlfriend (and maybe too long-suffering in the end for my tastes) Madeline is writing her thesis on “The Marriage Plot” which lies at the heart of many of Austen’s novels. She is a book lover, and I love reading novels that are self reflexive like that – ones that are nodding to the books that the author has been read, shaped by, appreciated to get to the point where he/she is writing one themselves. Then crazy Mitchell rounds out this love triangle, and the ending is neither treacly nor expected. And the whole book is just exceptionally clever and sparky and kind of amazing. I would put it up there with A Visit from the Goon Squad as being in my top five of the past five years. You can listen to an excellent podcast of Eugenides in conversation with the ABC's Books and Arts program here