As I’m sure it was designed to do, the title of this book caught my eye. It stood out among the myriad titles on the reading list, written in pink ink on notebook paper, that I have tacked up in my cubicle. A heartbreaking work, it claimed to be, not just of regular, run-of-the-mill genius, but of staggering genius. I had no idea what it was about, just that the title made it out to be something amazing. But “heartbreaking” and “staggering genius” can describe a lot of genres. Was it a transcendent romance for the ages? Was it a tale of atrocious abuse and neglect overcome by unwavering optimism? Did it follow the lives and trials of the sentient roundworms inhabiting a planet in the Mintaka solar system? Whatever it was, I was ready to be forever changed by reading it.

Turns out that it’s a memoir. Sort of. It covers actual events that happened in Eggers’ life — the loss of his parents to cancer, becoming the guardian to his younger brother, their move to San Francisco — but it’s clear that the author has exaggerated or fictionalized certain parts of the story. Dave chronicles his (often feeble) struggles to have an impact on the world, balancing his ambition with his new parental responsibilities. It is a blend of humor, philosophy and self-reference that makes for a compelling read.

Having finished it, I can definitively say that I don’t know what to make of this book. On the one hand, it was beautifully written. Eggers shows a prodigious command of the English language, and his writing is a true pleasure to read. The narrator speaks intimately to the reader, as if confiding in a friend — a mix of gritty truths, ridiculous exaggerations and deep personal insights. By the end, I felt like he was someone I knew.

On the other hand, the fact/fiction blend blurred the storyline and sometimes made it difficult to follow. Eggers often exaggerates events or dialogue or makes them up. Which is cool. The book does not claim to be completely true, and sometimes alludes to the fact that certain parts are indeed made up. This creates an interesting reader-narrator relationship. The reader recognizes that the narrator is unreliable, but the narrator admits that he is unreliable, so that, I guess, makes him reliable in his unreliability? If that sentence is confusing, then you’ve gotten a taste of how I felt the whole time I was reading.

Eggers often takes breaks from exposition in order to wax poetic on subjects such as his (or his character’s) personal insecurities and where to draw the line between personal and public life. It’s all very honest and self-referential, but can seem a bit masturbatory at times. The book is very self-aware, admitting its self-awareness, and then admitting the admission of its self-awareness. It got (for me) tiresome after a while. I get it, dude. You’re so meta it’s killing me.

So while I enjoyed reading A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, it was not the life-changing experience I expected from the title. Was it heartbreaking? Not particularly. The characters were appropriately tragic and identifiable, but never vulnerable enough to elicit an emotional response anywhere close to “heartbreaking”. Is Dave Eggers a genius? It’s very possible. His writing is very good. That writing an entire book which basically screams “recognize me for my genius!” won him a bunch of awards is pretty genius in and of itself. But I’m not entirely sure I buy it.