Eligible by Curtis Sittenfeld
Published 2016 · 528 pages · 115,000 words · about 8 hours at an average pace · Literary Fiction, Romance, Satire & Humor
How hard is Eligible to read?
Eligible scores 18 out of 100 for difficulty on ReadingRate, making it relatively accessible. The score is a weighted composite of nine measures: four of how hard the prose is to parse, five of how hard the meaning is to extract.
- Vocabulary: 22 out of 100
- Contemporary American vocabulary. Medical and media terminology. Accessible throughout.
- Sentence structure: 22 out of 100
- Abstraction: 15 out of 100
- Concrete social comedy. The Austen parallel is structural, not intellectual.
- Information density: 30 out of 100
- Dense social detail about Cincinnati, medicine, and family dynamics. Five sisters provide ample material.
- Narrative indirection: 15 out of 100
- Linear third-person narration following Liz. Austen's plot provides the roadmap.
- Symbolic density: 12 out of 100
- The Tudor house as the Bennet inheritance problem. The reality show as a commentary on public courtship.
- Ironic distance: 28 out of 100
- Sittenfeld's comic eye is sharp. The novel is affectionate but unsparing about American class pretensions.
- Resolution withholding: 12 out of 100
- Readers who know Pride and Prejudice know the outcome. The pleasure is in the translation.
- Structural complexity: 15 out of 100
- Linear narrative following Austen's plot structure. Clean and well-organized.
How Eligible is regarded
Eligible holds a literary regard score of 32 out of 100, weighing its place in the canon, its critical reception, its influence on other writers, and the standing of its author. Regard is measured separately from difficulty: a demanding book is not necessarily an admired one.