But while this narrative structure may keep readers thinking of crossroads, it’s not the novel’s most direct connection to the title. These stories run in five different directions but cross paths as Franzen revisits key events and themes. It follows not one single story but five different stories-or roads-told from the points of view of five Hildebrandts. The novel’s title mirrors its narrative structure. How well can we truly know someone? What does it mean to live and act in an authentic fashion? Are our attempts to be good forever tainted by our self-interests? How can we know or experience God? As he does, he asks us to consider all manner of big questions. Throughout the book’s nearly 600 pages, Franzen pries into the seemingly quiet existence of the suburban Hildebrandt family and exposes the tensions that threaten to pull its members apart. “Ambitious.” That’s the word you’ll find splattered across the many reviews of Jonathan Franzen’s new novel.
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