"The Candy House" by Jennifer Egan

The Candy House is a sequel of sorts to Egan's massively-successful A Visit From the Goon Squad. It follows the same structure--multi-genre, interwoven narratives--and even returns to characters from the first novel, though only on rereading my review of Goon did I realize just how many characters and stories reappear. I found this book to be far more forgettable than Goon, perhaps because the interlocking narrative is so common now (eg the recent Cloud Cuckoo Land). At far too many points did the book seem an exercise in connecting the disparate narratives, but I found it far too hard to keep the various characters straight in my head and eventually gave up. 

Even more disappointing, the novel centers around a social media invention called "Own Your Unconscious," where users upload all their memories and share them online. Weirdly, there's no questioning of the product itself. In the book memories are apparently akin to video recordings, rather than a product of individual experience and bias; two people witnessing the same event would have different memories, particularly if those memories were recalled years later, but the book accepts without question that the memory uploads reflect accurate recall. But this is ultimately a minor quibble because the sci-fi element is mostly ignored to explore general relationship issues. In fact, I'd argue Own Your Unconscious could have been dropped entirely without changing the book, so why include it at all? It feels like a red herring.

The individual stories are largely well-written, and Egan is good at capturing a variety of voices, even if (again) some--like the autistic counter--have been overdone at this point. A more patient reader, willing to connect the dots between stories and between this book and Goon, might have more fun.