This book is different from O’Brien’s others, and I cackled my way through it. Bizarre, dark and funny, it tells the surprisingly entertaining story of a lying, stalking, narcissistic sociopath. But I might be biased because it reminded me of my ex — ah, memories.

Full disclosure: I think that Tim O'Brien is one of America's best novelists over the last 50 years and has never gotten the widespread credit that he deserves. Despite winning a National Book Award, he's not the household name he should be. I place him in the same stratosphere with Roth, Updike, and Irving, to name a few. Particularly in this novel, which deals with a man caught in a maelstrom of love, romance, rejection and confusion.

O'Brien's novels are master accomplishments because of how they interweave strong plots, complex, often-scarred characters, and sparkling prose. "Tomcat in Love" is no different. While the novel is marketed as 'brilliantly funny' (which it is, at times), it is also brilliantly deep and compelling.

The book's hero, Tom Chippering, is a lovable, although unreliable narrator who made me ask myself, over and over again, "What is WRONG with this guy??? He just doesn't get the world around him."

But all Tom wants is love, particularly from his childhood sweetheart and now ex-wife, Lorna Sue. A woman who is a goddess in his world, the picture of romantic perfection, despite ultimately leaving him for another man.

As a result, Tom is in a tailspin throughout the book, trying to find himself and a replacement for Lorna Sue. His adventures, and his lack of social grace, often place him in unenviable positions with various ladies. It's like he can't help himself, and does not realize that a word here or a gesture there can be seen as offensive at best, misogynistic at worse. Much of the book's humor comes from the price he has to pay - over and over again - for these missteps.

Even though Tom is a Viet Nam vet and concocts convoluted revenge plots against on Lorna Sue and her new husband, he is still a sympathetic and appealing character. One has to wonder throughout the book if Tom has lost his mind, or is he just as damaged and lovestruck as most other jilted men who just want things to be the way that they used to be? Is his paranoia, and his inability to properly deal with women, the real him or just something that has consumed what used to be a reasonable man?

Fortunately, by the end of the book, all is revealed.

The writing was so good, and at times the book was laugh-out-loud funny. But there was no character that I liked or cared about. The main character was somewhat of a caricature, and the ending didn't ring true given the way the characters had developed over time.

This is a deeply weird book. I found myself rooting for the protagonist, but couldn't figure out why until I realized that he was never the villain. Misguided and strange, but a bad guy. The characters were well crafted, multi-dimensional, and flawed.

A rough slog in the middle, but with it in the end.

This is the second book I've read by master writer Tim O'Brien. I have only read the immortal "The Things they Carried" and having learned that "Tomcat in Love" was a comedy, I gave it a chance.

Professor Thomas Chippering of Linguistics, decorated Vietnam veteran is a horny middle aged man. He cannot let go of his ex wife Lorna Sue, his first love. He is having an affair with Donna Kooshof, a worldly and highly opinionated woman who is not afraid to tell him what she needs. He is in trouble at work for having a dalliance with his sexy student, Toni- whom he helps write her thesis, with sex along the way. Lorna Sue has incestuous feelings towards her brother Herbie, then marries a rich tycoon, running off to sunny Tampa, from Owego, Minnesota.

Thomas the tomcat eventually is fired from his professorship, winds up working at a daycare center, and hits rock bottom after an inability to let go of his wife, and indecision to remain with Mrs. Kooshof. Hopefully, there might be redemption for him?

When I read this book seeing that it was published in 1998, the reviews and blurbs were ecstatic calling it "wildly funny", "the great American novel" and comedy splattered all around. However, it seriously screams of the trope of the horny white man who cannot commit to his relationships, and uses sex to free him of his pain. It's screamed of hot white male glaze that I don't see much in today's books since our society is more aware that white male privilege is becoming a thing that's more and more under scrutiny. Also, the fuck scenes are icky and downright misogynistic. But O'Brien does know how to craft a magnificent sentence or two- and its the saving grace for me of why I do not hate this book, though I don't like any of the characters. Perhaps had I read this over 10 years ago, it might have been funnier, more empathic to me. I thought it an experimental exercise on writing something that's lighter than his other books, but I felt more pained and a bit put off by reading this.

If you love horrible people you’ll love this book. O’Brien is incredibly talented at writing complex and sinister characters/events and I never knew where we were going to end up. Personally I wanted the narrator to suffer more, but I’ll survive with a happy ending

Hated the main character. Didn’t like or understand any of the others either. Finally gave up after reading about two thirds of it. I do not recommend this book.

I prefer to LIKE the protagonist in a story. In this book, I had a difficult time sympathizing with this character. However, Tim O'Brian's use of language and how he has incorporated it into the story was fantastic. I'll read more by him because of it. Worth the time, for sure.

Imo, one of O'Brien's lesser novels but still worth the read

Eh...
First off... I think I've read this book before. If not this one, one very similar to it. As I was reading it (and steadily loathing the main character more and more), I felt like I had experienced some of this before. Something was triggering a memory for me. You know, that whole 'Great American Novel" thing.
Then, let's talk about unloveable main characters. I did not love Thomas H. Chippering. I did not feel any sympathy, or empathy otherwise. I felt nothing for him but sheer annoyance. Here we're presented with this middle-aged man, freshly divorced from a relationship that probably should have never happened. Neither Tom nor Lorna Sue was happy with one another, and yet Tom persists in seeking revenge on her for leaving and drives himself literally insane by trying to win her back. During all of this, he can't help but be a narcissistic prick. He keeps a ledger book of every supposed encounter with women he has had, which is normally imagined. Apparently if a woman has a buxom chest and a friendly smile, she's giving him an invitation to sex. And while he withholds from actually partaking in the act of sex, the obsession alone is enough to have his wife feel that he's cheating on her. And I totally agree. Even when he meets a woman who is quite literally the most tolerant woman on Earth, he still persists in these stupid flirtations. In fact, he gets manipulated by a four-year-old girl because he's frankly too stupid with women to know how to handle it (he spanks her and she tells him to lay on her towel with him or else she'll tell her Mommy. He writes this in his ledger as well... effing creep).
Like I said, the story line was one I felt I had read before. The narrator's voice grated my nerves, especially how he continually used a condescending, snooty tone with teaching people about language. I found there was a lot of fluff in the language, a little bit too much off topic, that made me want to skim the pages. The footnotes did the same. They added nothing to the story for me. And the narrator himself... easy to hate. I didn't wish him a redemptive ending. In fact, I wished that his newly acquired lover moved on and found someone worthy of her. She was pretty well the only good character in the book, and it turned out that she was weak-willed with love to a crazy man.

Tomcat is a delusional linguistics professor who fancies himself a ladies man who is happily married to his childhood sweetheart. But she's left him and he's pathetic plus he represses everything from a lifetime of bad behavior, and PTSD from combat to boot. I think I might have been ok with this in short story form, but it was way too schlocky yuk-yuk for me at 368 pages.

Tomcat in Love A Novel
Tim O Brien

This is a test! There is no right answer.

He had the appearance, if I may say so, of an ostrich attempting to swallow a toaster.

If you find that funny, you will love Tomcat in Love. If you think otherwise, you may find the book less pleasing in direct proportion to the depths of your otherwise.

Sometimes I try to imagine what a book might be like if it was made into a movie. Would I like the movie? Do I like raunchy PG-13 movies? Did I like Cheech & Chong? Enough said.

What do others think? On the front cover of the book is this quote:

Tomcat in Love is a wonderful novel, laugh-out-loud funny, one of the best books I’ve come across in years…-- Washington Post

With the help of Google, I find the actual 1998 review. And, in fact, the quote is accurate. But, as it has been said elsewhere: “…no accounting for taste…” and “… everyone has a right to their own opinion…” I would add, “Do not believe reviewer David Nicholson.”

There are 1254 ratings on GR that yield a less than scintillating 3.32 average. Now, I can relate to that. A bit high, I think, but no accounting for taste. About the same number give it two stars as give it a five. Put me in the two column. [Three years later there are more ratings, 2369, but still only a 3.38 average. I am decreasing my own rating to one star since I figure that is what a book ought to get if you are unable to get beyond halfway after two tries.]

In my era the term Tomcat was associated with the male cat on the prowl. Can a cat exhibit promiscuous activity? Amoral sex is common in Tomcat in Love. Not lyrical enough to be erotic, not graphic enough to be pornographic and not funny enough to be ribald or farcical. The shortest self-description by Tom: “I was no simple Lothario; I was complicated.” A longer description by a woman: “If you ask my opinion, you’re a sick, dangerous, compulsive skirt chaser. And a sneak. And a liar.”

The book started out with humor. I was believing its own book cover raves about itself. I like words and thought some of the “linguistic” aspects were clever. But then I just got tired of it. My recommendation: read Tim O Brien’s The Things They Carried and In the Lake of the Woods.