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    The Mysteries Of Pittsburgh
    The Mysteries Of Pittsburgh
    The Mysteries Of Pittsburgh
    Audiobook8 hours

    The Mysteries Of Pittsburgh

    Written by Michael Chabon

    Narrated by Chris Andrew Ciulla

    3.5/5

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    About this audiobook

    Michael Chabon masterfully renders the funny, tender, and captivating first-person narrative of Art Bechstein, whose confusion and heartache echo the tones of literary forebears like The Catcher in the Rye's Holden Caulfield and The Great Gatsby's Nick Carraway.

    The Mysteries of Pittsburgh incontrovertibly established Chabon as a powerful force in contemporary fiction, even before his Pulitzer Prize-winning novel The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier Clay set the literary world spinning. An unforgettable story of coming of age in America, it is also an essential milestone in the movement of American fiction, from a novelist who has become one of the most important and enduring voices of this generation.

    Editor's Note

    An extraordinary debut…

    This New York Times bestselling debut is an engrossing, skillfully layered coming-of-age story, where the everyday becomes extraordinary.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherTantor Media, Inc
    Release dateApr 3, 2018
    ISBN9781977378859
    Author

    Michael Chabon

    Michael Chabon is the bestselling and Pulitzer Prize-winning author of seven novels – including The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay and The Yiddish Policemen's Union – two collections of short stories, and one other work of non-fiction. He lives in Berkeley, California, with his wife and children.

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    Reviews for The Mysteries Of Pittsburgh

    3.5/5

    1,047 ratings36 reviews

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    • 3/5
      I absolutely loved Gabon’s novel “Kavalier and Clay”, but this novel was a disappointment. While there was what you could call a plot, it meandered and never really became defined well enough to make me care what happened.

      I’m not sure what Gabon was going for here, but I don’t think he hit the target.
    • 4/5
      Enjoyed this a lot...I dove in as i prefer, with basically zero knowledge of the book, topic, author, etc......i just started reading. Seems as if this was a rather insightful story of that first summer post college graduation.....that last gasp before officially starting adulthood. Arthur, with the grudging blessing (and money!) from his father, spends a final summer in Pittsburgh before figuring out what he wants to do. Lots of drinking, smoking cigarettes, new friends, lovers, experiences, family revelations, road trips, etc. Relationships thrive, they wallow, they fail......unexpected unions, attractions to uncomfortable situations, confronting his father and the reason behind his support......all told in a very relatable manner with honesty and humility. Some characters i really disliked...but that was likely the point.....and Arthur's willingness to step so far out of his box was unnerving now and then......but it still seemed believable to a point. Not bad for a first novel by Chabon. (My particular volume had Chabon's own thoughts on writing this, his first novel....and I really enjoyed that, as well!) Looking forward to his remaining works...most of which are already on my shelves.
    • 2/5
      Fewer mobsters and less mystery than I was expecting. It turns out to be a drunk, stupid college students' self-discovery story, and it does a fine job at it, but it's not really my thing.
    • 3/5
      Come for the evocative post-industrial collapse / pre-eds & meds Pittsburgh descriptions, but don't stay for the cardboard characters or meandering final third.
    • 4/5
      Like all of my favorite lit books this one ends by not really ending. It's just another life chapter closed. This book had me going until the end though. The characters were semi-realistic and a bit flighty but that's ok
    • 4/5
      It was interesting to read the first novel of Michael Chabon who I consider to be one of the best writers out there. His newest novel, Moonglow is one of favorite novels of recent years. From what I understand, the Mysteries of Pittsburgh was submitted as a final thesis for college and his advisor sent it to the publisher, which launched his career. My main complaint is not with the writing but just the simple notion that I didn't love the main character, Authur, who in the course of one summer meets three important people. One is another Art, whose rich, glamorous gay lifestyle lures our protagonist into at least bisexuality; and there is Phlox who is beautiful and also falls in love with Aurthur, and finally Cleveland, the rich kid turned badass who longs to impress Arthur's father, a local gangster. The novel , like Gatsby, takes place during a pivotal summer in the life of the narrator. Arthur has finished college and soon will be working in a business that his father has arranged for him. The writing is always wonderful but in this case I prefer not reading about Authur's sexual adventures and indecisions. Nyt there is much to admire here, and what the novel lacks in insight it compensates for in language, wit and ambition, in the sheer exuberance of its voice: the voice of a young writer with tremendous skill as he discovers, joyously, just what his words can do. Some good lines:Because, hell, because I corrupted your youth. I don’t know. I took you out to the stockyard behind the family hot dog stand.When I remember that dizzy summer, that dull, stupid, lovely, dire summer, it seems that in those days I ate my lunches, smelled another’s skin, noticed a shade of yellow, even simply sat, with greater lust and hopefulness—and that I lusted with greater faith, hoped with greater abandon. The people I loved were celebrities, surrounded by rumor and fanfare; the places I sat with them, movie lots and monuments. No doubt all of this is not true remembrance but the ruinous work of nostalgia, which obliterates the past, and no doubt, as usual, I have exaggerated everything.
    • 3/5
      I received this audiobook from LTER. I liked Kavalier and Clay and expected to like this too. But I didn’t. I just didn’t get a feel for any of the characters. Nothing really happens. It’s just a brief post grad period in a guys life. Maybe I am too far removed from it all. I liked the writing, just not the storyline.
    • 1/5
      My eyes rolled so much when reading this, I thought they might pop out of their sockets. This is one of our great American writers? A Pulitzer Prize winner? What a sad state of affairs that is. I suppose Kavalier & Clay is the one I'm supposed to read...but since I received this from the publisher for free, and it was by Chabon, I thought at least it would be good if not great.It was terrible. Just awful. There was almost nothing about it that I liked. It was nearly unbearable, and I would have put it aside without finishing it if I hadn't owed the publisher "an honest review" based on the free book. The Mysteries of Pittsburgh really got on my nerves. First person stories can be tricky. You have to be willing to live with the character for an entire book. The main character here was a whiny, douchebaggy, lying, pseudo-witty, insecure, recent college grad trying to "find himself." I just wanted to constantly slap him, not to hear his semi-clever little jokes and his oh-so-tedious struggle with "deciding" if he was gay or not gay. Get the fuck over it, buddy. I couldn't care about this guys struggle to decide whether or not to cheat on his girlfriend (whom he thought he loved) with this charming Machiavellian hipster dude. I have no doubt there are many in society today who struggle with their gender ambiguity. But reading about this sort of whiny struggle in the 80s didn't provide any better understanding about the struggle today. It's seemed so dated...this book has lost its relevancy since it was published in 1988.Perhaps that is mainly due to the awkwardness and contrived nature of all the relationship in this particular book. I'm sure in the hands of other more capable authors, a story of facing ones gender ambiguity could be meaningful in ANY time setting. But in this particular story, the storytelling no longer seemed relevant. I would think that almost everyone who reads Pulitzer Prize winning mainstream literary authors is 99.9% likely to be socially liberal even if they are economically libertarian. So who is gaining empathy for someone struggling with being gay in the 80s? We've moved on past this, and the battle lines are clearly set between the right-wing racist/homophobes authoritarians who support the Republican party and the liberal humanists who range from supporting Democrats to anarchists, socialists, etc. Right wing homophobes are not reading Chabon and aren't going to be moved either by this annoying hipster college grad weiner who can't make up his mind about what he is. If you are trying to get readers to accept and like someone struggling with gender ambiguity then create someone we can care about. The other characters were equally smarmy, phony and awkwardly written. And their relationships were just odd and a few steps off from realistic. I liked none of them nor believed any of them despite the profusion of tiny character details intended to build realism. I fluctuate in my appreciation for realistic characters and experimentalism in literature. It's books like these where they teeter between contrived details to create believability and "quality" writing (yes, he's not incompetent as a writer) where I become most disgusted by realism, feeling the author is just attempting to trick the reader into believing his story.This book's premise seems dated (it literally is, being set in the 80s) and besides the point. In fact, it's so besides the point that the supposedly realistic characters in this book never ONCE mentioned anything about politics. It's set in the 80s when Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan were Presidents for fuck's sake. And not a single mention of it by any character? These were all kids just graduated or recently graduating college. And the government never once crossed their mind? That reinforced the bizarre myopia for me. And writing about Pittsburgh...if the setting was important enough to put in the title, then what was the point of that? What did we learn about Pittsburgh? One would think we would learn about the experience of living in Pittsburgh, perhaps the collapse of the steel industry and blue-collar career opportunities and unions would be some aspect of the book. Nope. For some reason Chabon elected to choose semi-intellectual college grads who seems more like New Yorkers to represent the city. And gangsters. Yes, old school mafia gangsters. These choices baffled me and felt completely irrelevant to understand...the city or anyone, for that matter. Post-college grads trying to "find themselves" could happen in any city, but somehow this was supposed to represent Pittsburgh? And somehow the mashup of recognizing one's gayness or bisexuality gets mashed up with dealing with his father being in the mafia? It was a schizophrenic muddle that did not come together.I get the feeling some of the relationship stories in here were fictionalized autobiography. Big. Deal. They made for a terrible and terribly annoying story. If this character was somehow based himself, then all I can say he, he makes a terrible character that I wanted to run over with a car.Mysteries of Pittsburgh? More like the Mysteries of Why Chabon Wrote this Self Indulgent Waste of Time. It's just a bad book.
    • 5/5
      Once in a while I read a book that, after a few chapters, puzzles me. “Wait,” I think, “is this a novel or a memoir?” That's usually a credit to the author (assuming it's a novel, of course) for creating a narrative so seamless that it seems almost too real not to be. Michael Chabon's The Mysteries of Pittsburgh struck me that way. The characters are vivid, the setting is evocative, the dialog natural. I still think there's a lot of Chabon in the character of Bechstein, but that's just speculation. Regardless, the narrative engaged me, and although the coming of age novel is well-trod territory, I found this to be a singular pleasure. I received this audio book through LibraryThing's Early Review program, in exchange for an unbiased review.
    • 4/5
      Some authors hit big and then get worse. This book shows that Mr. Chabon gets better with each book, as it should be. I like early works.
    • 5/5
      A marvelous coming of age tale as can only be told by Michael Chabon. I think he is an incredible storyteller. He creates iconic characters, uses language masterfully, and is very witty. It was fun to read his first novel after having enjoyed all those which followed!
    • 3/5
      A typical coming of age, realism story. It's set during a summer break of an average college student named Arthur. He meets and befriends a quirky girl, a homosexual man, and an alcoholic. Throughout the book Arthur is trying to figure out who he is and what he wants in life. It's not a Catcher in the Rye or a Great Gatsby, but it is a pretty decent read. It is also very well written (as it is written by Chabon), if not a little simple; I give it a three star rating because of it's simplicity.
      Chabon gives common (and not far-fetched or fantastic) reasons for his character's back stories, but I do suppose therein lies its strength. It resonates with the average person. Beware, though. The Mysteries of Pittsburgh can offend moral sensibilities as it deals with sexuality and instances of legal wrongdoing and how it is handled. Fortunately, though, Chabon does not use many swear words which tend to pervade books of this nature, and, for that matter, many modern fiction books. Overall, a unique read that won't take up much of your time.
    • 4/5
      Mixed up male, coming of age, once again. Done well. I guess every guywriter has one of these in him.
    • 3/5
      Art is klaar met studeren, in Pittsburgh (Pennsylvania), en voor hem ligt de laatste zomer waarin hij kan flierefluiten. Hij maakt nieuwe vrienden, waaronder de elegante Arthur, met aantrekkelijke social skills: “Arthur stood straight, looked deeply, beautifully sympathetic for perhaps a tenth of a second, and nodded, with that fine, empty courtesy he seemed to show everyone. He had an effortless genius for manners; remarkable, perhaps, just because it was unique among people his age. It seemed to me that Arthur, with his old, strange courtliness, would triumph over any scene he chose to make; that in a world made miserable by frankness, his handsome condescension, his elitism, and his perfect lack of candor were fatal gifts, and I wanted to serve in his corps and to be socially graceful.”Het boek is niet rijk aan voorbeelden die illustreren hoe Art dit in de praktijk brengt (vind ik), maar ze zijn er wel, bv waar Art een sullige collega met een eloquente volzin in verwarring brengt: “Following Arthur’s example, I’d begun to affect an overgrammatical, precious manner toward people like Gil Frick, to keep them, as I imagined Arthur saw it, from wanting to talk to me.” Art vindt zelf in elk geval dat hij Arthurs invloed in zich opneemt, zoals ook die van Cleveland, een andere vriend die hij deze zomer leert kennen:“I know I loved Cleveland and Arthur, because they changed me; I know that Arthur lies behind the kindly, absent distance I maintain from other people, that behind each sudden, shocking breach of it lies Cleveland; I have from them my vocabulary, my dress, my love of idle talk.”In de loop van het boek raakt Art heen en weer geslingerd tussen twee geliefden (een man en een vrouw), en kruipt de criminele achtergrond van zijn vader hinderlijk zijn eigen leven in. Dat laatste is vooral de schuld van Cleveland, die crimineel carrière wil maken. Ik haakte gaandeweg af, bijvoorbeeld omdat Art zich al te zeer voor het karretje van Cleveland liet spannen, wat wel spectaculaire, maar niet echt geloofwaardige scenes opleverde. Ook vond ik de vrouwelijke geliefde een flat character. Maar dat neemt allemaal niet weg dat het verlangen naar self-fashioning mooi en scherp wordt belicht.
    • 3/5
      Sort of a "coming of age" affair, or is that "coming out", or just "coming"? Sort of Chabon's calling card as a writer, the book demonstrates an early skill at writing, not so much at plot and character development. I wouldn't start here if I wanted to read Chabon and hadn't done so.
    • 4/5
      I loved this book. It's a great spring/summer read. I read most of it lying on my stomach on a blanket in the backyard on the most beautiful day in May. Michael Chabon before he was MICHAEL CHABON! A coming of age story full of wonder and adventure and just a touch of sadness.
    • 3/5
      Well, I think this book is a little socially immature..the writing is still of pretty high quality but I would not recommend ever reading this book over The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay unless you're going through a sexual identity crisis. I do like the bit about the Cloud Factory though...
    • 3/5
      It didn't really catch me, perhaps I'm too old for young adult's summer season or I'm simply not familar with the American way of life. Anyway, the story is telling about how five young adults are spending their summer term, how a young male is caught in finding his sexual preference and also is trying to become independent from his father. His father's mafioso relationship doesn't really fit into the plot and was for me more annoying.
    • 4/5
      A coming-of-age story that packs on the sentimentality, often justifiably. The plot seems a bit forced from time to time - particularly at the conclusion - but always moves along speedily. The characters do much of the novel's heavy lifting, adding intrigue, humor, and warmth that bring what could be dry melodrama to a glowing story. Chabon is clearly a skilled writer, offering playfully eloquent descriptions and piercing insight. THE MYSTERIES OF PITTSBURGH is a mostly-rewarding first novel, held back by its blankly unfulfilling conclusion.
    • 5/5
      Art Bechstein, fresh out of college, notices an attractive young man in the library, no sooner is he outside the library than this attractive young man, the very appealing and flamboyant Arthur is standing beside him. In addition the attentions of Arthur, Art struggles with his uncertain feelings for Phlox, the strange girl who works in the library. So begins a summer of friendships, sex and parties, and a beautiful relationship that eventually dispels any doubts Art might have had about his sexuality. Add to that the hint of gangsters and the mysterious smoke from a factory; it all contributes to captivating read. This is a thoroughly engrossing and interesting story, beautifully written and full of vitality, wit and humour.
    • 3/5
      I cannot get a personal handle on Michael Chabon. Sometimes I think he’s phenomenal and sometimes he leaves me completely cold. In this case, he just left me somewhere in between. The story is about one summer in the life of Art Berchstein. He falls in a couple of different loves and has to sort out what it means to be who he is. Yep, your basic coming of age story, but Chabon can never let it be normal. First, he always writes well. Second, this coming of age includes coming to grips with a gangster family background. (This is nicely underplayed until the book builds. In other words, it seems a throwaway, and then becomes important.)Really good stuff throughout. And yet, at the end of it all, it still didn’t move me as much as I would expect. A good story and good characters. Yet it still ended with the “what do I care about these people” that often plagues these angsty coming of age stories.It is not to say that I don’t recommend this book. However, I’m not sure I would recommend it to anyone else, either.
    • 3/5
      Starts off wanting to be he Great Gatsby or The Catcher in the Rye, half-way through settles for Less Than Zero, ends up St Elmo's Fire II.
    • 4/5
      Michael Chabon is delicious; his prose style is scrumptious. This is amazing in its own right, but more so because it was his Master's thesis. Damn. And now I get to keep this book, because I had borrowed it from Katy but then accidentally left it out in the rain because I am a terrible person.
    • 5/5
      Since the first time i read it i fell in love with it, it has humor and gives a view of what life really is like, the movie wasn't awesome but the book deserves five stars
    • 2/5
      I'd actually give it a 3.5. A book that kept me interested, but did not blow me away. If you like bildungsroman, you'll probably like this.
    • 4/5
      This book makes me happy because it is not perfect, but it is good and it shows the promise of what's to come for Chabon as a writer. And that is enjoyable.
    • 2/5
      I don't have much to say about T.M.O.P. except that "it was okay." I didn't dislike it, but I didn't really connect with it. It didn't grab, challenge, molest, or seduce me. It was okay.
    • 4/5
      In the late '80s, when brat pack lit was the rage and the likes of Jay McInerney, Bret Easton Ellis and Tama Janowitz were getting all the attention, Chabon was quietly doing the real stuff. This is his first novel and it's great. Fortunately, he has since been recognized for his talent. As a coming-of-age novel of the 1980s, you can't do better than this.
    • 2/5
      The action in The Mysteries of Pittsburgh takes place the summer after Art Bechstein graduates from university. He's always led a pretty protected and risk-averse life, and he's not really sure what he wants to do, but he knows that he is looking for something bigger, wilder, more exotic. At the start of the summer he falls in with a crowd of people who seem to fulfill this need - they have all recreated themselves as Gatsby-esque Wild Young Things. But his involvement with them sets off a sequence of events - with consequences that spiral out of control.This was Chabon's first novel, written while he was still a student, and it shows: there are signs of the style, imagination and playfulness which make Kavalier & Clay as good as it is - but this feels as if he is just trying to fit too many ideas in - and some of it (Phlox's personality, Cleveland's descent) are a bit too cartoonishly drawn.
    • 2/5
      My friend and I were in the middle of a converstation about some very strange relationships we had been in with men, when she suddenly shouted "You must read 'The Myteries of Pittsburgh' by Chabon!" So I picked it up. I found it to be a light read (pretty good for the airplane). Although I enjoyed the character of Phlox, I was pretty disapointed with the rest of the book. Poor Phlox is all I can say. I don't think this is a horrible book necessarily, but it certainly does not deserve 5 stars. Basically, the characters bored me and I found myself skimming over large sections. Worth the time only if you have nothing better to do, or if you a girl who has ever lived through having your boyfriend dump you for a man and want to re-live your pain.