The brief wondrous life of Oscar Wao

Junot Díaz

Penguin, 2007 - Fiction - 339 pages

This is the long-awaited first novel from one of the most original and memorable writers working today.

Things have never been easy for Oscar, a sweet but disastrously overweight, lovesick Dominican ghetto nerd. From his home in New Jersey, where he lives with his old-world mother and rebellious sister, Oscar dreams of becoming the Dominican J. R. R. Tolkien and, most of all, of finding love. But he may never get what he wants, thanks to the Fukœ-the curse that has haunted the Oscar's family for generations, dooming them to prison, torture, tragic accidents, and, above all, ill-starred love. Oscar, still waiting for his first kiss, is just its most recent victim.

D’az immerses us in the tumultuous life of Oscar and the history of the family at large, rendering with genuine warmth and dazzling energy, humor, and insight the Dominican-American experience, and, ultimately, the endless human capacity to persevere in the face of heartbreak and loss. A true literary triumph, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao confirms Junot Diaz as one of the best and most exciting voices of our time.

What people are saying

Review: The Brief Wondrous Life Of Oscar Wao

User Review  - Cassy - Goodreads

Honestly, if someone had warned me that this book would barrage me, page after page, line after line, clause after clause, with obscure dorky references, Dominican Republican history lessons, and ...

Review: The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao

User Review  - Steve aka Sckenda - Goodreads

--“There is a seed of courage hidden (often deeply, it is true) in the heart of the fattest and most timid Hobbit, waiting for some final and desperate danger to make it grow.” (LOTR: The Fellowship ...

Contents

• Section 1: 1
• Section 2: 11
• Section 3: 51
• Section 4: 77
• Section 5: 167
• Section 6: 204
• Section 7: 205
• Section 8: 211
• Section 9: 263
• Section 10: 311
• Section 11: 315
• Section 12: 323
• Section 13: 329
• Section 14: 333
• Section 15: 337
• Section 16: 341

About the author

Junot Díaz’s fiction has appeared inThe New Yorker,The Paris Review, andThe Best American Short Stories. His highly-anticipated first novel,The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, was greeted with rapturous reviews, including Michiko Kakutani inThe New York Timescalling it “a book that decisively establishes him as one of contemporary fiction's most distinctive and irresistible new voices.” His debut story collection,Drown, published eleven years prior toOscar Wao, was also met with unprecedented acclaim; it became a national bestseller, won numerous awards, and has since grown into a landmark of contemporary literature. Born in the Dominican Republic and raised in New Jersey, Díaz lives in New York City and is a professor of creative writing at MIT.

Bibliographic information

• Title: The brief wondrous life of Oscar Wao
• Author: Junot Díaz
• Publisher: Penguin, 2007
• ISBN: 1594489580, 9781594489587
• Length: 339 pages
• Subjects: Fiction / Literary