This is one of those books that everybody should read.
A moving portrayal of people born in the wrong place in the wrong time. People who long for something more than life has given them, something not even they know for fact exists. So they tell stories. At times funny, at times absolutely heartbreaking, these stories reveal a vast yet repressed inner world, populated by elements of a scattered and confused culture. This is a work so descriptive, so insightful, that it's natural to give it the name of "generation-defining" (as the Guardian indeed did!) The characters, their memories, their hopes and dreams and fears are all achingly real.
An absolutely gripping read, wildly detailed yet to the point. I finished it in one afternoon. This is an absolute tour de force, at once depressing and...oddly uplifting?
Do yourself a favor and read it. NOW.