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| White Noise (Picador Books) | 
 enlarge | Author: Don Delillo
Publisher: Picador
Category: Book
List Price: £7.99
Buy Used: £2.25
You Save: £5.74 (72%)
New (33) from £2.61
Avg. Customer Rating:  14 reviews
Sales Rank: 3341
Media: Paperback
Edition: New Ed
Pages: 326
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.5
Dimensions (in): 7.6 x 5.1 x 0.9
ISBN: 0330291084
Dewey Decimal Number: 813
EAN: 9780330291088
ASIN: 0330291084
Publication Date: October 10, 1986
Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days
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| Customer Reviews: Read 9 more reviews...
 One star is too much praise! October 11, 2008
When one picks up a book from the "Cult Fiction" section in any bookshop, it's normally there for a reason. I expected from reading the blurb to White Noise that I would be in for, and I quote, "brilliant and often very funny dialogue" and an exposition of "our common obsession with mortality". So, a darkly funny book about death, something that immediately appealed to me. How mislead I was.
What I was, in fact, in for was a slow and torturous read. The characters of Jack and Babette were, for the most part, very boring, and the only instance in the story where they seemed to develop partially-formed identities of their own seemed like a last-ditch attempt, as if no real thought had been made as to who they were until the last minute. I had completely forgotten who Murray was supposed to be by the end of the book, his presence was so meaningless. As for the festival of children featured, they confused and frustrated me beyond belief.
The plot was the most disappointing part of the whole experience. I suppose I should have realised as soon as I read the less than specific blurb that it was going to be bad. One can't write a novel about all the instances of two people discussing Hitler and celebrity deaths. I can see what DeLillo was trying to do; write a series of short stories that introduced different chapters in the Gladney family's lives, but he missed the boat completely. Instead, what you are faced with is 3 chapters with no beginning, middle or end, just a series of analogies and non-events that try to convey a sense of philosophical meaning. As previous reviewers have no doubt mentioned, this book tries to make you think, but it fails by trying too hard. I have read children's books that have made me contemplate the human condition more than this book.
Perhaps the most frustrating part about the whole thing is that you are given a lot of information that you really don't need, like on the first page, where you are given a list of items packed in station wagons. A LIST, I tell you! I was told in Year 5 that lists equal bad writing. DeLillo is almost projectile vomiting pieces of worthless information at the reader, like what colour a character's jumper is, while at the same time is neglecting elaborating on his characters personalities or even the town they live in. A really good story could have come from these people, but it is because of such dire writing that no such wonder appears.
I refuse to understand why this is so highly praised, or why it is a "must-read". DeLillo is the worst author I have ever had the misfortune of encountering, and it has made me strongly question the meaning of the words "Cult Fiction".
 Postmodern Classic? what it means to be alive! September 10, 2008
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I've come to this book from reading the ideas studied in Post-modernism and the novel came recommended along the lines of Paul Auster and Thomas Pynchon.
My experiences with both of these other authors have been negative, for very different reasons. (Auster's inability to write without his vomit inducing smugness and Pynchon purely and simply because of the density of the prose...yes alright...I promise to return to Pynchon in the future...). So that being said, thankfully, I enjoyed this book immensely.
Delillo's phrasing is skilled and astute; he's a writer who constructs prose with economy and flair, with well observed situations and a sharp critique for common everyman foibles.
The flow of the book is always engaging and the characters are constantly funny, quirky and human. The narrative is straight but with the constant use of stream of consciousness thoughts and dialogue it feels like it should be more challenging to read. It isn't.
The plot on retrospect is a touch convoluted but whilst reading it doesn't detract from wanting to know what happens next.
Ideas play a big part of the book (the simulated taking prevalence over the real, the inability to get reliable information in a communication age, the meaning of death...) but it is far from academic, dry or preachy.
This is a beautiful and tender story, well told, imaginative and literary in the truest sense i.e. that it leaves you thinking about what it means to be alive.
Amazingly overated February 21, 2008
5 out of 8 found this review helpful
This was my introduction to Delillo and it was a huge disapointment, leaving me puzzled as to what people find so brilliant about him. The characters are awful cardboard contructs who nobody could ever care about for a moment. The plot is non-existent. I know, I know, it is a brilliant post modern satire on consumerist society and disaster as spectacle and plot is not the point. But you know what, it is not brilliant abd books do actually need plots or at least stories. Pretty much every theme in it had been dealt with by earlier writers so it felt curiously old fashioned for a mid eighties book. The philosophical musings are half baked and hardly insightful.
Oh and the humour, well, it just isnt funny. Didnt make me laugh anyway. I feel a bit bad slamming an author like this. He did his best no doubt and good luck to him but the critical acclaim is just astonishing.
The final thing that people talk about is his writing - the brilliant phrases and glittering sentences. Well, I will have to say the quality of the writing was what made me grind on for a hundred pages in the hope that something might happen or that the characters might somehow become more engaging and less one dimensional. It was pretty good. Not the prose of genius as it is sometimes described but he turns a neat phrase here and there. And to be ultra fair the idea of Hitler Studies was probably pretty clever in 1984 or so.
But really, who wants to read hundreds of pages of this sort of damp attack on consumerism. The praise heaped on it seems to typify what has gone wrong with literary fiction and the criticism of literature.
Worth a read if you are wanting to strike literary poses, if you want a story worth reading don't bother.
 Curate's Egg November 7, 2007
Some nice ideas and some good lines but it just doesn't seem to hang together. Given its frequent comic pretensions it has the major failing of - well - not being very funny. The characterisation is often annoying and frankly it's extremely put-downable.
 Love this book... June 20, 2007
0 out of 2 found this review helpful
This is one of my all time favourite books. Contrary to other reviews, I found this the most accessible of Delillo's fiction. It's a humerous look at the state of modern American culture.
Exposure to an 'airborne toxic event' causes Jack to confront his own mortality and seek out a black market drug called Dylar to allay his fear of death. This book is brimming with witty observations and ridiculous dialogue. The character of Murray is laugh out loud funny. Definitely worth reading!
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