The Corrections

I read Jonathan Franzen's The Corrections recently.  Several times I was tempted to quit this book.  A couple times I wish I hadn't finished it.   The reason I wanted to put this book down?  Sometimes Franzen goes too far.  In this novel, Franzen is the "Family Guy" of American novelists.  Intentionally crude and outrageously disrespectful - oh, wait now, do I sound like a stuffy old lady?  Well, I don't care.  His story was compelling if you could get past the unnecessary coarseness.  The story is about the Lambert family, Alfred and Enid and their three children, Gary, Chip and Denise. Their dysfunction is comical and sometimes painful to read.  Alfred suffers from the indignity of Parkinson's Disease in his retirement years.  Don't ever give this book to someone with Parkinson's Disease, it would be cruel.  This book won a lot of awards when it came out in 2001. At times I liked and disliked all five of the main characters.  The pace was good and the ending very dramatic and satisfying.  If only he wasn't so crude I would have totally liked this book.