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Curator Reviews

Robert Longo

This is simply brilliant writing, especially the way in which he makes the reader complicit. Classically painted, pure American perversion.

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Edmund White

This book would probably be shunned today. Even though Humbert Humbert is clearly a villain, the very subject of pedophilia is now considered too transgressive. But Nabokov had to reach far in order to redeem the romantic novel, which had become trite.

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Lena Dunham

This book is unusual in many ways, and gets lots of credit for changing the face of modern fiction—but not enough credit for how fully realized a character Lolita is, despite the fact that we are seeing her through the lens of her stalker. The use of language is just impossibly great.

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Robert Longo

This is simply brilliant writing, especially the way in which he makes the reader complicit. Classically painted, pure American perversion.

View Robert Longo's Top 10 Favorite Books
Michael Stipe

His humor and grasp of humanity and language thrill.

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Jo Nesbø

How do you make the reader sympathize, or at least tolerate reading about, a man who is lusting for a child? I don’t know. You have to be good. And it’s probably a good idea to start the novel with the potential child molester declaring his love in a passionate and honest way, so you can always retreat to that later, when you want to flee: he actually loves her.

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Chip Kidd

As a brilliantly merciless portrait of mid-20th century middle America alone, this book is a masterpiece. But we all know it is much more than that. I tend to see it as an intriguingly fiendish parody of “Moby Dick.” 

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