It was indeed overwritten as I'd read critics say, but usually the content made it enjoyable anyway: interesting and disparate cities, family and class, early adolescent friendship, dealing with your own grief and how other people insinuate themselves in it. It's less enjoyable as the book goes on and culminates in a frustrating, heady conceit. It felt like she spent spent 700 pages getting at an idea and, having lost her nerve, spent the last few rhapsodizing instead, not giving the reader enough credit.