How many ways are there of being alive?This was my second time though The Gold Bug Variations. For brevity’s sake (I could write a lot, so be thankful), I’ve left my original review below as most of it still holds. Here are just a few further thoughts.There are faults in this book. It is over-written (Powers has turned every possible dial up to 11), it could be 200 pages shorter, it contains technical, scientific passages that will baffle all but the expert. But I still give it 5 stars for one s...

A Source of Meditative AweAs soon as I finished reading this novel, I wanted to respond the only way I could that would do justice to my feelings for the book: and that was to admit that I was in a state of wonder and to say that, in Richard Powers’ own words, the novel was "a source of meditative awe".Although, at 639 pages, the novel was long, it was enough, neither too little nor too much. Still I didn’t want it to end, not so much when it did, but at all.Recognition of the VariationsTo the e...

In my review of 2666, I wrote about the effectiveness of ambiguity; the power of allowing the reader to infer connections and actively build a personal theory of meaning about a novel. The Gold Bug Variations takes a different approach. Compare it to Gravity’s Rainbow (to which it is on the back cover): Gravity’s Rainbow never spells out its central metaphor; it remains elusive and unbounded, allowed to permeate the novel in unexpected ways. By contrast, Powers never misses an opportunity to bre...

This was my penultimate Powers novel (I haven't yet managed to get hold of a copy of Prisoner's Dilemma, its immediate predecessor). It is a book which I had been looking forward to because of its musical content and some interesting reviews, but for me it did not quite meet my high expectations, perhaps because Powers just had too many ideas to shoehorn in, and the result is over-long and quite hard work to read. I am not sure I fully understood the scientific content either.There are three mai...

Dear Richard Powers, I'm sorry I gave up on your book about a third of the way into it. I don't normally do that. Even if I'm trapped in an airport newsstand without a book, and end up buying "The Hunt for Red October", or some Neil Gaiman jerk-off dorkfest, I'll usually see it through to the end out of what I can only guess to be some misplaced romantic loyalty to the printed word, or possibly a mild to medium case of obsessive-compulsive disorder. "The Gold Bug Variations" however, proved pain...

Music of the Genetic CodeEach time I have finished reading a book by the author (The Echo Maker, The Time of Our Singing, and Orfeo ), true Powers fans have chimed in with, "Ah, but you must try The Gold Bug Variations!" For them, apparently, it stands as a gold standard of the author's work. It is certainly the richest, most knowledge-packed, monster-marvel of a book by Powers (or just about anyone else) that you could hope to read. Totally amazing, but also immensely challenging; I can't he...

It's been about five years since I read this book. It was so good, so smart and so well constructed that I haven't read another Richard Powers book since. I feel like his books need to be saved for just the right time, I don't know when that time is, but I'd always like to have another of his books to read for the first time waiting for me, sort of like Raymond Chandler or the last DFW stories I haven't read yet.

This book is a colossal failure, where colossal describes the magnitude not of the failure but the book. It just goes on and on. My audiobook went 32.5 hours (apparently the print version is 640 pages). At some point I lost track of time and just waited bloody-mindedly for it to end, like Covid-19.Powers' writing resides in the grey zone between science fiction and the "literary" kind. It feels like science fiction, because it is poorly written but full of interesting scientific ideas. But Power...

I have long said that an entire undergraduate degree program could be delivered using this novel and its range of reference as the sole text. I still believe that fully after what must be at least the 10th time through it. Even the things that have changed in the 30 years since it appeared could still be tracked for wider cultural significance—for example, the “inviolable” World Trade towers, etc. A masterpiece of integration between the arts and the sciences.

I actually didn't finish this book. I got 1/3 of the way through it, when I suddenly realized that I didn't like any of the characters. This is a book about socially awkward and introverted people for whom mundane occurrences are wrought with brooding revelation and significance. It is well written, with prose that at times can be as disjointed and cryptic--yet feelingly flowing--as its subject matter. But this is a problem I have had with some other of the author's books (which I finished)--it'...

A mid-50's scientist was on the verge of real discovery in the realms of DNA research, and nothing happened. Decades later a librarian wants to know why. Where'd he go? What happened?If you liked Gravity's Rainbow you might want to give The Gold Bug Variations a look. It has perhaps not quite a Pynchonian level of technical discussion and detail, but a lot nonetheless; Power's voice is hard work, but after awhile I found it growing on me. Rich characterization, imagery, and arcane references abo...

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The Gold Bug Variations wrecked the world of one jon faith a long time ago. My ecstatic reply generated ripples of both interest and disquiet . I loved the three characters, loved the Midwestern backdrop, the nerdy affinity that adults could maintain with straight faces. No, there wasn't much beer drinking, but the rich foam of ideas was a fair compensation. What followed was pure reverence. Then I had a girlfriend who found the novel to be shit. It should be noted that she was an actual scienti...

I had not heard of Richard Power before I picked up a copy of The Goldbug Variations, so I didn't have much of a preconceived idea of what to expect. First thing I did was open up the book randomly to a few pages and read some sentences to get the authors general style. First I noticed the density of the style. I'm ok with that. I tend to like dense and even write that way some times. But then I noticed that as far as I could tell the sentences didn't really mean anything. Well they would probab...

More people who love fiction need to discover Richard Powers. His work isn't the most poetic or character-driven, but they offer so much else. Gold Bug and Three Farmers on their Way to a Dance are among my favorite books (but avoid Operation Wandering Soul).A story of two temporally separated yet linked couples (why do I love that gimmick so?), this novel is essentially about variations on themes, codes: in music, painting, computers, and the discovery of DNA. Cerebral and curious and charming....

This book, is it really a book or something like a book, story, epic epigraph, symphony, et al. I took my time reading because, well, it's an overgrown path and weedy. Like the other five or so RP's novels I've read this one is by default pedagogic in multiple vector and/or theme discoursing in technical ways to the core of its subject, here DNA and coding for the evolving concatenation of life; Bach's magisterial variations in the Goldberg's; information everything processing; obscure landscape...