Facebook: The Novel

Published June 5, 2010 at 1:58 a.m.
The internet makes periodic, seemingly in-nocuous appearances throughout Jennifer Egan's new novel,...In the first chapter, a character considers Googling her psychiatrist. Later, members of an African safari reconnect on Facebook, and a character's 9-year-old daughter spends much of her time "in a pink beanbag chair, doing homework on her laptop and IMing her friends." But it is not until the final chapter, titled "Pure Language," that it becomes apparent that Egan is using online communication and social networks to explore the way the Internet makes traditional narrative struc-tures feel obsolete.

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