A review by lola425
The Emperor's Children by Claire Messud

4.0

Kind of surprised by all the hate on this book. It's no better or worse than anything Franzen or Eugenides or Harbach or Wolitzer has written. I thought that Messud got the story just about right. I actually liked her privileged, whiny thirty-somethings more than in some other books about the same generation that I've read. Murray was spot-on, I could picture him (and his type) quite clearly. The Julius character could easily have been cut, I think, and the themes would have remained intact. Is it overwritten? It didn't strike me that way. To me, it wasn't glaring, and I usually pick up on an author who is trying to be overly clever. Not the impression I got here. I did feel like the use of 9/11 as a way to bring the story to a head was a little easy. I liked both Messud's book of novellas and The Woman Upstairs so I'm not surprised I liked this.