time in a visit from the goon squad

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A Visit from the Goon Squad

Jennifer egan.

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Time and Memory

A Visit from the Goon Squad serves as an in depth exploration of the passage of time, the effects of aging on individual lives, and the longing for the past through memory. The novel’s title even speaks directly to the theme of time. Bosco , the former guitarist of The Conduits, who has become fat, alcoholic, and suicidal, states, “Time’s a goon, right?” Traditionally, a goon was an individual who inflicts fear and violence on…

Identity, Authenticity, and Meaning

The issue of identity is a prominent theme in A Visit from the Goon Squad , as Egan explores the extent to which identity is inherent and the ways in which it is assumed. The novel’s characters struggle to find meaning and authenticity in their lives, and they use different methods to discover, create, and escape their identities. The novel’s two primary characters, Sasha and Bennie , are two examples of characters that face challenges…

Connection, Disconnection, and Technology

The theme of Connection and Disconnection is finely balanced in Egan’s novel. Structurally, the novel highlights the way in which the characters’ lives are woven together. Characters from one story emerge in later stories as background characters, and background characters in some stories take center stage at other points in the novel. For example, the story “Ask Me if I Care” is narrated by Rhea and includes Jocelyn as a side character. Later in the…

Fame, Art, and Popular Culture

A Visit from the Goon Squad offers a strong critique of popular culture. Egan accomplishes this criticism primarily through her exploration of the music industry, but film, photography, and journalism are also investigated in her novel. Egan draws attention to the way in which trends come and go, and the effects of these cultural shifts. What is popular in one moment—for example, punk rock—is replaced by another trend soon after—such as overproduced pop music or…

Ruin and Redemption

The theme of ruin and redemption is present throughout Egan’s novel. This theme fits nicely alongside the novel’s other themes, as the characters find themselves crushed by time, by their self-centered and isolating ways of living, and by shifts in American culture. Throughout the novel, each of the major characters finds him- or herself at a low point. Sasha ’s story shows her slipping deeper into ruin as the result of her stealing, her isolation…

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Time, Thrashing to Its Own Rock Beat

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By Janet Maslin

• June 20, 2010

A music mogul named Lou is one of the many characters who drift through Jennifer Egan’s spiky, shape-shifting new book, “A Visit From the Goon Squad.” Whether this tough, uncategorizable work of fiction is a novel, a collection of carefully arranged interlocking stories or simply a display of Ms. Egan’s extreme virtuosity, the same characters pop up in different parts of it. Lou is a case in point. He appears early and then burns through a few of Ms. Egan’s adjacent (though not consecutive) chapters, ending up very much the worse for wear.

Lou is the fulcrum of “Ask Me if I Care,” a section of the book narrated by a high school girl named Rhea. “Nineteen eighty is almost here, thank God,” she says, setting this particular section’s time, tone and intergenerational hostility. “The hippies are getting old, they blew their brains on acid and now they’re begging on street corners all over San Francisco. Their hair is tangled and their bare feet are thick and gray as shoes. We’re sick of them.”

But the slick, successful 40-something Lou, “a music producer who knows Bill Graham personally”, is no burnout. He’s living the high life, snorting cocaine and using his show-business clout to seduce teenage girls. When Rhea glimpses pictures of Lou’s children in his apartment amid the electric guitars and gold records, she has the guts to get angry at him. Lou taunts her by announcing that he’ll never get old; Rhea tells him he’s old already.

In “Safari,” the story that immediately follows, Lou is six years younger. His age can be pinpointed by a reference to the age of his daughter, Charlie, who is 14 in “Safari” but was 20 in “Ask Me if I Care.” Lou is accompanied on a trip to Africa by a couple of his children and also by his young girlfriend, a graduate student named Mindy. And Mindy is enough of a provocation to rattle other members of the “Safari” group, particularly Rolph, Lou’s teenage son.

Lou makes his exit in “You (Plural).” Here he is an old man dying in a hospital bed, and Rhea and a girlfriend from “Ask Me if I Care” come to say goodbye. They were high school students when he met them; now Rhea is 43, married and a mother of three. The encounter is sad but not poignant. All the people in these three Lou-related stories have been mugged by the goon squad of Ms. Egan’s title.

Ms. Egan uses goon as a synonym for time, as in: “Time’s a goon, right? You gonna let that goon push you around?” Taking some of her inspiration from Proust’s “In Search of Lost Time” as well as some from “The Sopranos,” she creates a set of characters with assorted links to the music business and lets time have its way with them. Virtually no one in this elaborately convoluted book winds up the better for wear. But Ms. Egan can be such a piercingly astute storyteller that the exhilaration of reading her outweighs the bleak destinies she describes.

It’s an understatement to say that every character in this book has a dark side. Sasha, the young woman with whom “A Visit From the Goon Squad” begins, has a compulsion to steal, and the array of objects she has filched looks “like the work of a miniaturist beaver.” In a book eager to incorporate the technology of its times into what its characters think and do, 35-year-old Sasha spends “Found Objects” on an awkward date with a man she met online. She winds up with his wallet.

Sasha has worked for 12 years for the Sow’s Ear record label as the assistant to Bennie, another recurring character. And Bennie is seen from his youth (eager to get into the record business, and wowed by Lou) to his prime, and then on a downhill slide. This book’s single most startling section describes Bennie’s encounter with Scotty, a damaged kid and former band mate of Bennie’s who has turned into a dangerously embittered failure. When Scotty wangles an audience with the all-powerful Bennie in Bennie’s New York office, he arrives armed with a fish that he caught in the East River.

Sasha figures tangentially in this story, “X’s and O’s.” She’s the gatekeeper at Bennie’s office, and she must spend some awkward moments with Scotty and his dead fish before Bennie saves her. As Scotty, narrating this chapter, reports, Sasha is visibly relieved when Scotty is whisked away and is not her problem anymore. “I gave her a wink whose exact translation was: Don’t be so sure, darling ,” Scotty says.

The showiest part of this acrobatic book is the part that doesn’t look like fiction writing at all: Ms. Egan spends 70-odd pages on PowerPoint charts meant to reflect the rogue thoughts of two adolescents, who turn out to be Sasha’s children. The passage of that much time moves “A Visit From the Goon Squad” somewhere into the future, but Ms. Egan clearly enjoys tackling such challenges. And if the PowerPoint ploy seems risky, it winds up being no less welcome than any of her other methods. She also makes chillingly weird use of text-message-ese: “if thr r childrn, thr mst b a fUtr, rt?” It takes temerity to even ask, let alone text, that question.

The children of the future give the book a flash of science fiction. Ms. Egan’s vision is mostly dystopian, but what makes it most memorable is the eccentricity. She imagines that the aftermath of 15 years of war have led to a baby boom. And technology has eagerly leapt to accommodate a new demographic group: gadget-loving children. Pity the poor rock stars who find themselves at the mercy of toddlers who have purchasing power. Ms. Egan slyly turns one “Goon Squad” recurring character into one of those stars.

A VISIT FROM THE GOON SQUAD

By Jennifer Egan

Illustrated. 274 pages. Alfred A. Knopf. $25.95.

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A Visit from the Goon Squad

By jennifer egan.

‘A Visit from the Goon Squad’ by Jennifer Egan follows a multi-style narration where some are done in the first person, some in the second, and others in the third person. The book consists of 13 chapters and each tells a complete, independent story with a different protagonist of its own.

Article written by Victor Onuorah

Degree in Journalism from University of Nigeria, Nsukka.

In the book’s opening plot, Bennie Salazar, a former punk rockstar turn record producer, and Sasha Grady Blake, his assistant appear to be the two characters to which tenths of other later characters are connected. The book spans fifty years – from the 1970s to the 2020s – and the stories are not nearly as chronologically arranged as one might expect , but that all adds to the overall excitement and creativity in the book. Here’s all you need to know about the plot of Jennifer Egan’s ‘ A Visit from the Goon Squad .’

‘Spoiler Free’ Summary of A Visit from the Goon Squad

As Sasha Grady sits with her therapist, dissecting the many ways to overcome her kleptomania, she recounts all the times she had shamelessly taken from her family, friends, and strangers.

Sasha is many things, but poor is not one of them. But this is a mental health issue. So it seems. But she is not the only one with such issues. So did her boss of 12 years. And all their other equally passionate punk rock music fanatic friends who go way back to the 70s. Scotty, Rhea, Jocelyn, Drew, Rob… all of them. 

Like Sasha, the time has hit them so hard into submission and resignation. But for Sasha, yes, she might have spent her youth living on the edge. She might have brought disgrace to her family and friends with her shameless pilferings. But this time, all she wants is one last late chance to get her life together and do one honorable thing for a change. If not for her interest, then for the interest of her children unborn.

Full Summary of A Visit from the Goon Squad

Warning – This article contains important details and spoilers

Part A (Chapters 1 – 6)

Sasha books a date with her therapist with the hope of finding a permanent solution for her kleptomania, the reason she would lose her job as Bennie’s assistant. During her session, she recalls two stealing incidents; the first was a lady’s purse at an eatery which she returned after being cornered. The second was done on Alex, her date, at her house.

In the next chapter, Bennie, a forty-something years old music producer, and his son Christopher attend an indoor music performance by his band, and everyone – including his now assistant Sasha – attends. As the beat plays, the normally frigid Bennie is feeling some sort of arousal, but a series of humiliating thoughts snap him out of it as he drives home wife his son – dropping Sasha at her place.

We are taken aback to the late 70s, where two friends – Rhea and Jocelyn – have heavily invested interest in punk rock. While Rhea, a very fanatic punk rocker, has self-esteem issues and feels less beautiful because of her facial dots, Jocelyn, a beautiful but naive underage girl, is sharing a carnal knowledge with rock music icon, Lou – and would eventually elope with him. But before that happens, the girls get him to attend their friend Bennie’s show with his rookie band, ‘The Flaming Dildos,’ an event that would see Lou take Bennie under his wing resulting in Bennie’s later success in the industry.

Chapter four opens with Lou out on vacation on the safari with his two children – a boy named Rolph and a girl named Charlie, his girlfriend Mindy, and two other entourages. On the trip, Mindy clashes with Lou as she can’t seem to get along with his children, and when a chance show of bravery proves Albert (one of the entourages) a bigger man after he guns down a lion about to attack them, Mindy, who feels charmed by the event, secretly makes out with him (Albert). Lou’s enraged but later wins his girl back (and based on the flashforward in this chapter) – even weds her and have two children together before they divorce. The foreseeable future isn’t as great either for Lou’s children – as Rolph will die first from a disconnect from his father, and later from suicide. Charlie will go to law school and later, out of wedlock, have a son she will secretly call Rolph.

The next chapter sets in a few decades forward with Lou now old and on his dying bed. As the women stand over him and catch up, a clear picture is painted of how much has happened since they last saw each other; Rhea is married with kids, and Jocelyn has gone back to live with her mother and enrolled for a degree in UCLA at age 43. Jocelyn still holds resentment toward Lou for wasting an important part of her life and wishes him death, but Rhea seems to interfere to calm the tension. They layer help Lou outside to a pool area, and – on Lou’s request – the three of them hold hands in one final act of unity and forgiveness.

The final chapter of part A takes us back into Scotty’s life after he and Bennie went their separate ways around chapter two. Scotty is living like a failure, withdrawn from social life, and finds new joy in fishing, but he still loves music and occasionally plays. One day Scotty pays a visit to his old friend Bennie but is left devastated by how successful Bennie has become. As they talk, there is a sort of bad blood between them as back in the day, Scotty won the battle for Alice and married her (although they would later divorcé catastrophically), to Bennie’s despair. Scotty then leaves with Bennie’s business card and a faint hope of contacting him in the future about a possible music project.

Part B (Chapters 7 – 13)

Part B opens with Bernie moving to Crandale with his PR wife Stephanie, but both can’t seem to fit into the bigoted neighborhood because Bennie is Latino and Stephanie is a tattooed woman. Stephanie’s older brother and ex-convict Jules ( he was a journalist imprisoned for attempting rape on his source) – who also stays with them – accompany her to Bosco’s, a once punk music icon now sick, bloated, and dying, but wants one last concert where he pushes himself and dies poetically on the stage. Jules thinks it’s a good idea, has an interest, and wants to write about it – even though Stephanie feels otherwise. Returning home that night, Stephanie accidentally finds her tennis friend Katty’s bobby pin on the floor as Bennie goes to use the bathroom – confirming her suspicions he’d been cheating on her.

Chapter two of part B brings the story of a former famous PR consultant, Dolly Peale, who has this one job of selling a genocidal General. Personally, Dolly needs this work to set her career back on track after her last event left several celebrities going home with massive burns. She travels with her daughter Lulu and actress Kitty – who is supposed to only pose for the camera with the General but goes off spotlighting him about the genocide event. Kitty is taken away by the General’s entourage as Dolly flees with her daughter. She would never return to her PR job again and would instead travel to a remote neighborhood seeking a fresh start as a burger store owner. 

Stephanie’s brother Jules Jones narrates the next chapter in the form of a magazine article he wrote from jail. Jules details the interview he did on Kitty and how he got a little personal (comparing her with his ex-fiancé) – leading to the part where he attempted rape on her. Kitty, however, wrote him apologizing for what transpired between them – an act which further made the actress more popular. 

Rob tells the next story – taking us back to the days of him, Sasha, and Drew studying at New York University. Rob is gay and has mental health issues, and had attempted suicide in the past. While the three of them are close-knot friends, Sasha seems to confide in Rob but secretly loves Drew. After catching the Conduit concert one day, while Sasha meets and talks (for the first time) with Bennie, her friends Rob and Drew stroll down to East River, where Rob leaks Sasha’s decadent past lifestyle in Naples. Drew is distraught and goes solo-swimming in the river, and as Rob trails behind him, he is unlucky and drowns. 

Sasha’s Uncle Ted Holland narrates the next chapter and talks about how he’s being paid ( by Sasha’s stepfather ) to track Sasha down in Naples. Ted – who is a man of art – is distracted from his main quest and begins visiting museums and viewing fascinating artworks. By chance, he stumbles into Sasha in the street and convinces her to meet up and talk. When this happens, both talk about their problems and soon go to the club, where Sasha steals his wallet and flees. Ted can trace her home and get her to return his wallet. As they sit together and look out the window – enjoying the warming blaze from the sun, we are taken into the future where Sasha is married and have two kids Uncle Ted will visit her, and both will share similar scenarios again.

The next chapter takes us several decades into the future, where Sasha’s daughter Alison tells the story of her family in a PowerPoint slide. She talks about the general mood in her family and how her busy doctor father, Drew, doesn’t seem to get along well with her autistic little brother Lincoln (whom she loves so much). And after he makes Lincoln cry so hard one day, Alison advises him to try working on the great pauses of rock music – as he (Lincoln) loves that. Alison has a mental health issue of her own, and something has pessimistic revelations about her family.

The concluding chapter returns us to Alex but in the future, and this time he and Dolly’s daughter Lulu (now a grownup) work with Bennie to sell Scotty Hausman’s upcoming concert via social media. Scotty had resigned from his janitorial job and returned to making music. On the day, Scotty has a fit because of the large crowd, but Lulu walks onto the stage with him as he plays. The concert is a hit, and they will be remembered for many years to come. Bennie and Alex take a walk; Bennie talks about Sasha and how he misses her. Alex can’t quite recall the details about her but seems to remember when they coincidentally walk into the building where Sasha had lived. But not anymore. As some new girl named Taylor comes out of the door playing with her keys.

What is Egan’s ‘ A Visit from the Goon Squad ’ about?

‘ A Visit from the Goon Squad ’ by Jennifer Egan is a book that captures the brutal reality of time flashing before people’s eyes, and they sometimes have to watch their dreams and aspirations disappear and unaccomplished.

How long does it take to reach ‘ A Visit from the Goon Squad ’ by Jennifer Egan?

It only takes a few hours to start and finish ‘ A Visit from the Goon Squad ,’ however, you might be required to spend extra hours revisiting previous pages and come back to current ones to be up to speed with all the characters and their role in the book. 

Is ‘ Goon Squad ’ a hard book to read?

Across its use of non-linear story chronology and multiple narrative styles, ‘ A Visit from the Goon Squad ’ can be tagged as a relatively harder book to read than the average book.

Who are the foundational characters in ‘ A Visit from the Goon Squad’ ?

Record producer Bennie Salazar and his assistant Sasha Grady Blake are the two foundational characters from whom all the other fleet of characters are connected. 

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About Victor Onuorah

Victor is as much a prolific writer as he is an avid reader. With a degree in Journalism, he goes around scouring literary storehouses and archives; picking up, dusting the dirt off, and leaving clean even the most crooked pieces of literature all with the skill of analysis.

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