I never read the reviews for this book before I started reading it and I wish I had to be prepared for the story I read. Most reviewers called it "pretentious" and I have to say it was the perfect word for the majority of this book. The writing style of the book itself was great with enough description to make you feel the time and place these characters were existing in without over explanation.The one thing I will say for this book, and the only reason I read it all was that the writing style was fantastic and engaging; even as I plowed through the "problems" of these vapid characters. The characters themselves are the worst kind of people. Privileged people feeling sorry for themselves over problems they created then taking out their frustrations on the world to make themselves feel better. 
 I had hoped when I was halfway through the book that these people would have some sort of epiphany or growth before the end of the book. I had the most hopeful about Mitchell as things looked grim for the other two protagonists. Mitchell was seeking solace in religion and even though I am not religious I have seen it fulfill people and I wanted it to at the very least inspire him to be a better person. He ended up finding religion, but not to do good for others, he found that distasteful, he used it as a club to beat others because it turned out to be the only way to make himself feel better about all his other poor life choices. 
 There are a lot of glowing reviews for this book and I considered that maybe the book itself is some kind of allegory that I am missing. I tried reading more into it as reviewed it with my book club, but I found that I still had little sympathy for the characters and found I still disliked the book. I'd heard good things about this author and I may yet check out another of his books, but this book was certainly not what I expected in the worst way.