Odd approach
I was puzzled by Gold's choices wrt the use of historical figures. For me it worked best when they were used cameo-style, as with 'Fun in Hi Skule' which was in fact (thanks Wikipedia!) the name of the Marx Brothers' stage show later adapted as 'Horse Feathers' on screen.

Puisque touts les creatures sont au fond des freres, il faut traiter vos betes comme vous traitez vos amis.

I agree, dantebk, that the things you mentioned seemed odd. I guess I just allowed the book a certain almost-real-world status that kept them from bothering me too much.

Likeable
I very much enjoyed Carter as the central figure in the book though I'm not sure we can describe him as fully fleshed-out as a character for many of the reasons already given.

I think it was the carousel production that pushed me over the edge. Had it been described as what the audience *thought* they were seeing I might have been able to buy it, but my recollection is that it was framed as a straight narrative of the illusion as presented.

I guess I'd stop short of 'marvel' but I did really like the ending as well.

Real Magic?
I had a very similiar reaction to Tasha to some of the illusions and effects as described - completely unbelievable without recourse to 'real' magic. This was probably my single biggest complaint about the book, which I should say I thoroughly enjoyed. Todd used the phrase 'popcorn fiction' and that's…

Author as magician
I'm of two minds about Donna's question. I guess the problem is that I don't see stage magic as unpredictable or suspenseful, nor did I have any doubt that the story would be neatly and cleverly wrapped up at the end. So I can endorse the parallel between book and magic show, just not in the way it…

Sargeant Carter Beats the Devil Out of Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C

My own feeling was that Richard realized that Laura couldn't possibly have written that book and (correctly) recognized it as an explicit recounting of his wife's ongoing affair.

I used the term excerpts only to describe the way they were presented episodically throughout the larger novel. I tend to agree with you, particularly because we are specifically given the BA epilogue at the end. It would be interesting to strip those sections out and see whether they form a plausible whole.

While I don't disagree, I would point out that one should keep in mind that the only things we know about Iris herself come from what Atwood tells us. I'm not trying to belabor the obvious here; rather, I found the mulitiple layers of stories-within-stories to be one of the most provocative things about this book. The…

I'm not sure how I would have finished the book if I found spending time with Iris to be a chore. Her bitterness and cynicism were front-and-center but for whatever reason I still found her sympathetic. There may be a personal component to that (let's just say that Iris reminded me of my own mother at times) but I…

Ouch. I'm going to avoid bridges while driving home tonight…

I too was blindsided by the revelation of rape perhaps because I was so smug about having figured out the 'authorship' question midway through the book. Well-played, Ms. Atwood.

Very nice - this hadn't occurred to me before, but it resonates now.

I'm with Tasha on the jealousy question. It never even crossed my mind that Iris envied Laura's posthumous fame.

I hadn't really considered the shadings of Richard's portrayal this carefully before, but I'll agree that one child molester (Mr. whatshisname, the tutor) was plenty. Unfortunately Richard's preying on Laura was a necessary to the plot Atwood had set into motion. Interestingly, I still regard him as a minor character…

Themes
Having heard of (but not read) Atwood before I went in expecting a 'feminist' novel, whatever that might be. So I wasn't surprised to find that the book featured a female protagonist. What interested me was that almost everybody's flaws were very visible, regardless of their gender. In fact, the most…

#1: 1976 Aerosmith with opener Rick Derringer (!)
#2: 1977 Led Zeppelin @ Madison Sq. Garden.