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About 100 pages into Brief wonderous life of oscar wao. I've avoided (not purposefully but quite easily) most of the fashionable multicultural lit (with the exception of Rushdie, Soyinka, other genuinely talented writers) for a long time, so finally, I decided "what could it hurt" and rented this book out with the intention of giving it an honest chance (despite my disdain for the literary establishment).

I usually don't come on here because it is as much of a cesspool as we all say it is and the median level of intelligence you can expect from a discussion is often woefully low (despite people's desperate posturing to contradict that in appearance).

I'm curious to hear any of your opinions on Oscar Wao, but I'd really like to avoid the obligatory 'cuck this cuck that niggerbaby blue' bullshit. I'm not really enjoying it. For the life of me, I can't understand why this won the Pulitzer. It's boring, for one, and reads like a young adult book because Diaz can't write for 5 pages without injecting some kind of cartoonish romance into the narrative. The characters aren't believable, lack dimension, etc. The incessant street-slang and boring colloquial similes are, unsurprisingly, boring. Issues like the race, class, government, etc. are dealt with immaturely (not just ironically, but without significant insight).

I'd honestly like for someone to explain to me why this book has received so many godamn accolades and why Diaz is lauded as a literary icon when the book is so goddamn mediocre?