Wow! What a trip down memory lane with Klosterman’s examination of the nineties. This is a book I never knew I wanted until I read it.

Perhaps the most interesting portion is when he takes a look at how technological advances in this decade forever reshaped western culture. After all, this was the real advent of the internet as we know it today.

His writing style is easy and the topic is sure to interest millennials and anyone else with a curiosity on how the nineties helped usher in where we are today.

Thank you to NetGalley and Penguin Press for a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Chuck Klosterman is arguably the preeminent writer of pop culture commentary of the past 20 years. I say “arguably” only for the sake of others – to my mind, it’s him and then everyone else. No one else has come close to putting together his combination of wry observation, pop expertise, humor and sheer flat-out writing ability.

So to say that I was enthusiastic to get my hands on a book where Klosterman deconstructs the 1990s – the decade where I too came of age with regard to cultural understanding – would be an undersell. My expectations were sky high – so high that I wondered if I had put the bar out of reach.

My concerns were utterly unfounded.

In “The Nineties,” Klosterman turns loose his considerable powers on a singular decade, one that marked a significant turning point in the direction our culture has taken. It is a thoughtful and engaging trip down the Gen-X rabbit hole, exploring a variety of impactful moments and events of that timeframe both in terms of what happened and – most importantly – the differences between that reality and our memories of it.

Despite what you may think, this is not a nostalgic book. In so many ways, the fog of nostalgia clouds our perspective on the past. Klosterman not only steers clear of that impulse, he pushes in a direction that is more straightforwardly analytical. This is a book that explores what happened and the subsequent consequences, and along the way, he breaks down the difference between the truth of the moment and the fictionalized stories we tell ourselves.

It starts with the very definition of the 1990s. Klosterman argues – quite convincingly, I might add – that the ‘90s as an era began with the fall of the Berlin Wall and ended with the events of 9/11. This is not a story that starts on January 1, 1990 and ends on December 31, 1999; it’s considerably more fluid like that, just as so many previous eras loosely defined by decades were.

As he tends to do, Klosterman goes full polymath here; while his focus is on popular culture, the truth is that all aspects of our experiences are reflected through said pop culture. Hence, we get chapters that dig into all manner of topics – music and sports and movies, sure, but also political and technological and sociological realities as well.

Right from the jump, Klosterman hits us with the unreliability of memory, choosing the now-ubiquitous notion of the Mandela Effect – something simply didn’t exist in the pre-internet age because if you didn’t know a fact and someone gave you an answer, odds are you just went with it, since you didn’t have access to the sum of all human knowledge via a device in your pocket.

You likely won’t be surprised by some of the entry points Klosterman uses here. There’s a great chapter about Nirvana, of course, though through that, we venture into a much more discursive conversation about the now-quaint notion of “selling out,” an act that was viewed as an ultimate sin then, but has become essentially a goal within itself (though some had that goal in the moment – see Brooks, Garth).

Politically, Klosterman devotes time to both the bizarre and ultimately Quixotic Ross Perot campaign for President in 1992 and the in-retrospect-baffling wide support for Bill Clinton in the midst of the scandal surrounding his affair with Monica Lewinsky. In both cases, we’re reminded of just how different our perspectives were and left to ask ourselves some interesting questions with the benefit of hindsight.

Do you ever consider how the explosive proliferation of the VCR in the 1990s influenced the movie business? How it fundamentally altered not just our ability to see movies, but the types of movies that would ultimately get made? Or how dismissive so many people initially were about the overall utility of the internet? How drastically and relatively suddenly our modes of communication changed?

Klosterman digs into these things and more. The MLB players strike of 1994 and Michael Jordan’s retirement from basketball to go flail at minor league fastballs for a while. The brief and inexplicable desire of corporations to sell us clear versions of other things. The omnipresence of TV and the waning days of the monoculture. “The Real World” and Biosphere 2, O.J. Simpson and Clarence Thomas. The evolution of fame and what that even means. On and on, discussing things you remember, things you don’t … and things you think you remember.

There’s a lot of thought given to the basic interiority of Generation X as well. Just as one example, he engages with the conversation surrounding a film like “Reality Bites,” where we’re ostensibly shown two sides of the same coin (and where we’re reminded that our initial impression of that film has likely changed in the ensuing years – i.e. Ethan Hawke’s slacker philosopher Troy versus Ben Stiller’s go-getter Michael) proves an apt way in which to contrast the prevailing attitudes of then versus now.

Each of the chapters is followed by a brief interstitial of sorts, a few pages devoted to an oppositional or mirrored perspective to what came before. Through striking this balance, we’re taken even deeper into the ideas and ideologies being explored and expressed, both then and now.

“The Nineties” is a bit different than the usual Klosterman fare. It’s a bit headier and a bit more serious, though he never loses track of the sense of the absurd that makes him such an engaging read. Serious, but not self-serious, if that makes sense – Klosterman is writing from a place of thoughtful consideration and in-depth analysis, but he also never stops being funny. It is a clever, smart book that will evoke memories while also causing you to question those same memories.

Seriously, how cool is that?

This isn’t the first attempt to contextualize the 1990s in the face of today. Nor will it be the last. One imagines that there will be plenty of examinations – nostalgic and otherwise – of this particular period. However, I don’t anticipate that anyone will be able to write a book on the subject that feels nearly as genuine, nearly as lived-in, as Klosterman has.

As someone who came of age during this period, “The Nineties” hits me where I live. The fact that it’s Chuck Klosterman doing the hitting makes it exponentially better. So throw on your flannel, put your “Nevermind” CD on in the car and head to Blockbuster to see what you can find in the rows between the walls of new releases.

Or better yet, just buy this book.

I am GenX. I was in my teens and early twenties during the nineties. I still love Nirvana and Guns n Roses. I remember Blockbuster fondly. I even had the phone on the cover of this book on my desk while I did my homework and wrote my term papers. And speaking of term papers, that is exactly what this book reads like… the author had to pick a decade and write a term paper on it. I didn’t dislike it, but I didn’t really enjoy most of it. It was well-written and well-researched, but so dry. I loved the idea of this book, but The Nineties turned out to be far more dull than the ‘90s ever were. If you’re interested in recent history definitely pick this up -- just be warned it’s not really a warm fuzzy romp through pop culture.

I'm grateful to NetGalley and Penguin Group/Penguin Press for the opportunity to read and review The Nineties.

I'm such a fan of Chuck Klosterman. I've always found his books so resonant - they're like talking to someone I grew up with. His age, background, and life trajectory track my own pretty closely, so I find him very relatable. Pair that with an engaging writing style and you have a formula for an enjoyable read. The book covers all the high points - and many of the low - of the era and the mixture of politics, culture, pop culture, and sensibility is round and robust. I thoroughly enjoyed it!

As someone who lived through the entire decade but only began to develop a cultural awareness toward the late '90s, this book didn't ping as much nostalgia for me as, say, an (inevitable?) retrospective on the '00s would. Instead, I found myself reacting to many of the touch points with the same bemusement one has when looking through an old family photo album. Do I remember that, or do I remember seeing the photo (or in this case, old footage) of that?
The absence of personal nostalgia and first-person experience allowed me to enjoy the book, the first half especially, as a digest of the decade (though it should be mentioned this is an American-centered view of the 1990s). The pop cultural moments were more interesting to me than the examination of politics or sports, but that's just personal preference and not indicative of the writing itself. I enjoy Klosterman's writing style, enjoy a good footnote, and found the book a solid read overall.

Chuck Klosterman, the people's intellectual, presents his latest treatise on political events, pop culture, and more with his book, The Nineties. I couldn't wait to get my hands on it because I always enjoy hearing his opinion even if I may disagree. However, I find his writing style and opinions mostly insightful and amiable, so it's rare I disagree.

The book's topics dance between the serious and not so serious about what was the 1990s. He covers the grunge movement and Nirvana while also reflecting on former President Clinton's legacy and scandals as well as shocking stories about the Oklahoma City bombing and the Heaven's Gate cult. But you'll also get a taste of the Titanic, Seinfeld, and, of course, coverage of the O.J. Simpson trial. In fact, some stories or cultural touchstones you may have forgotten. He also shows the evolution of the phone, so the cover photo really speaks to that monumental change in telecommunications.

During the book, you may be surprised how much times have changed and how the ominous threat of Y2K felt back in the day. It's a good recap of 1990s events that you may have filed away or misremembered. Some passages covering different events or fads can be somewhat dense and may start out where you're not sure where the author is taking you, but stay with him--it all works out in the end.

If you do pick up this book, remember to read the citations. I am a fan of Klosterman's, so I should have done so because it adds so much to what he's written about a particular time or event.

The last sentence or paragraph was so incredibly powerful and made what happened in the 1990s feel like child's play when you know what's coming up. The whole tone of the book changes, and it literally made my heart sink. The 1990s almost seem innocent after reading that last bit. It was seriously brilliant and profound but so dark and unlike the more whimsical passages Klosterman writes.

Since we're the same age, I feel like he captures the atmosphere of the era perfectly. So, if you're a fan, it's more than worth it to read this. And take a look at his other nonfiction books as well--they're so good.

I've read Chuck Klosterman's books of essays before so I knew what I expected and this did not disappoint. Some topics were more interesting to me (movies, TV, science) than others (music, politics, tech) but every chapter reminded me of chapters of my life in the 1990s. It was so enjoyable to be reading along and say to myself, "Oh, yeah! Tyson bit off Hollifield's ear!" or "Oh, yeah! Dolly the sheep... Garth Brooks pretended he was Chris Gaines for awhile... Thursday night NBC TV!"
Klosterman is easy to read, but always smart and insightful. He raises these memories then puts them in context of how they may have influenced the world we inhabit today. And he very charmingly explains how these crazy things ("Why did a computer chip need to know what year it was in order to work? If an Apple computer thought it was 1900, would it somehow believe it had not yet been invented?") didn't seem crazy at all at the time. The book seems to be equal parts nostalgia for people who lived though the nineties and explanatory text for younger people who didn't. I recommend this one.

I love two things: joyfully mocking tradition and sophistication with toilet humor and also analyzing pop culture through a highbrow lens. I go to Broad City for the former and Chuck Klosterman for the latter. Either way I'm having a good time.

I've been a fan of the author since 2003 when I read "Sex, Drugs, and Cocoa Puffs" after Entertainment Weekly gave it a glowing review. This is a person who can take any given topic and turn it into a 20 page essay with multiple footnotes and citations. His style hasn't changed much over the years but that's what I like about him.

I'm probably the prime demographic "The Nineties" is aimed at since I lived through that decade as a teenager - aware enough to recognize the topics discussed herein but not mature enough to grasp the nuances. CK lays out the straight facts, how Americans experienced events at the time, and gives his own analysis from a distance of two or three decades, two or three wars, two or three financial crises...

This is definitely a book I will recommend to patrons at my library.

Renowned culture critic and acclaimed music journalist, Chuck Klosterman attempts an acerbic encapsulation of the sign of times that was the Nineties. Pyrrhic obsessions and petulant trends are recollected in a biting style of writing that pulls no punches. The Nineties represented a decade where thousands of movie goers flocked to the theatres at the screening of the now forgotten Brad Pitt movie, Meet Joe Black, only because the theatres were airing the trailer of another upcoming Star Wars movie, The Phantom Menace. Imaging paying a full priced ticket, only to walk out of the theatre the moment a trailer of an upcoming production, ended! The nineties as Klosterman writes, was a paradoxical cluster of ten years. Obstinately riding on the coat tails of the Eighties, this was also a decade that stridently strove to divest itself of previous mores and birth new legacies of its own. “Every new generation tends to be intrigued by whatever generation existed 20 years earlier,” asserts Klosterman.

The sheer breadth of eclectic topics covered by Klosterman is mildly putting it, eye popping! The extensive bricolage includes the pervasive rise of the VHF phenomenon, the embrace of musical albums such as Nirvana’s Nevermind ; novels such as Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture, the fledgling rise of modem based internet and the emergence of television as a force to reckon with, with sit coms such as Seinfeld; and Friends. All these trends not just spawned a subculture of their own but inevitably (although inadvertently) set off an entire industry of copycats that played out competing versions ad nauseam. In fact according to Klosterman, ‘Nevermind’, denoted ‘the inflection point where one style of Western culture ends and another begins’.

The VHF cult in fact ought to take the credit for the rise of nonconformist film directors such as Kevin Smith and Quentin Tarantino. The duo cocked a thumb at prevailing film making mores and instituted a hitherto unimagined and oeuvre of film making.

Klosterman argues that TV was smack in the middle of events defining the nineties. The key seminal public discourses were predisposed by live TV performances, like the infamous O.J. Simpson trial (not to mention the chase sequence involving Simpson, a coterie of cops and thousands of cheering onlookers, an event that was telecast live on television for 45 minutes thereby interrupting a key sporting event taking place simultaneously), or Clarence Thomas’s visceral and clinical outrage that trumped Anita Hill’s more subdued testimony. The latter case, in 1991, assumed especial significance since the threats of sexual harassment cast an ominous shadow over the confirmation of Justice Thomas as associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. Thomas was nominated by President George H. W. Bush to succeed Thurgood Marshall. Thomas ultimately prevailed. These broadcasts, in the words of Klosterman represented, “real-time televised constructions, confidently broadcast with almost no understanding of what was actually happening or what was being seen.”

Vitriolic wit and mordant humour, two infallible trademarks of the Klosterman School of Writing find liberal expression in the book. The passages were Klosterman alludes to the dangerous practice of “Oprahfication” of things where criticisms and adumbrations are appropriated taking recourse to a devious slant are in one part humorous and in two other parts, introspective.

“The Nineties” is a spectacular Hodge podge of entertainment and emotions. Just like the nineties. Tupak Shakur, Eminem, Leonardo Di Caprio, Bill Clinton, Ralph Nader, Kevin Spacey, Alanis Morrisette and a scores of others waft in and out of this incredible book at the speed of light.

The discombobulated nineties, according to Klosterman, is best epitomised by a profound and metaphysical conversation adorning the sci-fi flick Matrix produced by the Wachowski Brothers. (The Wachowski brothers, incidentally, are now the Wachowski Sisters. Larry and Andy Wachowski, after successful undergoing gender altering surgeries are now Lana and Lilly Wachowski respectively.

The protagonist in the movie, (played by Keanu Reeves), Neo, upon learning that the world is nothing, but a make believe convoluted and complex computer simulation, asks: “This isn’t real?” Morpheus (played by Lawrence Fishburne), the character who reveals the state of things and play to a befuddled Neo, laconically and sardonically responds, “What is real? How do you define real?”

(The Nineties: A Book by Chuck Klosterman is published by the Penguin Press and will be available for sale from the 8th of February 2022 onwards)

Thank You Net Galley for the Advance Reviewer Copy!

The concept of this book sounded great but it felt very underwhelming. There was some very interesting and valid points made that made this worth the read. But it often felt like rambling for me. I was expecting a look into the pop culture of the decade and don’t feel like this really delivered for that.

Klosterman can do no wrong in my eyes. I’ve been reading his work for the past 16 years, and he’s an auto buy author for me. I thoroughly enjoyed this retrospective of high points of the nineties. Klosterman does come across as pretentious to me at certain points in the book, but I willingly overlook that. I love his perspective, I love what topics he includes, and I just love his writing.

I received a copy of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This was a well-written book. But, it was very different from what I was expecting. I was expecting it to be more of a fun look at the 90's and it ended up being very serious and kind of a slow moving book.

As a child born in 1986, the 90’s were the pinnacle of cool when I was a kid, and by the time I reached an age to take part in pop culture of the moment it was the early 00’s. But based on my keen observations, this book perfectly captures my childhood, all the things I remember of the decade and lots of things I had forgotten. This book succinctly describes the major differences of that decade and those that came before and after, and I found it interesting, thought provoking and nostalgic for “simpler” times.

I finished The Nineties with mixed feelings. On one hand, it is a wise, well-written examination of the decade, full of astute observations and analysis. But on the other, it isn't the book I expected it to be based on how it's been marketed. This reads less like commercial nonfiction and more like an academic text I would have been assigned in a grad school seminar. The throwback cover image and buzz I've seen on social media led me to believe this was going to be a bit more fun, and tap harder into the 90's nostalgia that is so popular right now. However, reading this felt more like an assignment than entertainment. I appreciate that Klosterman's style leans more cerebral, but would hesitate to recommend this book to the casual Gen X reader looking for a trip down memory lane. Readers should know going in that this book is intellectually demanding (which can be great when you're in the mood for it!) despite the fun, light impression the cover gives off.

I want to remember the 90's. The phone on the cover of this book, which I myself had proudly displayed on my nightstand as a kid, suggested The Nineties would contain reminders and analysis of similarly wildly popular items and events that have since fallen into the deep recesses of our collective consciousness. Unfortunately, Klosterman rehashed a lot of the usual talking points: OJ Simpson, the Clinton/Lewinsky scandal, Seinfeld, Michael Jordan. Also unfortunate, this is a collection of essays that have little in common except for the fact that they're generally about the 90's. Within essays, the voice is meandering and circumferential. It was difficult to discern what points Klosterman was trying to make as he connected random subjects without transition. It ended up reading like a somewhat academic stream of consciousness from the mind of a cis hetero white Gen Xer. That's not bad, and a lot of people will enjoy. It was just a droning, laborious read for me, and did not scratch my itch for nostalgia (or deliver the lighter tone and humor implied by the cover).

The Nineties: A Book by Chuck Klosterman is a highly recommended look back at the decade of the 1990's.

Presented as a group of essays or discussions of a wide variety of topics randomly organized and interconnected, Klosterman covers cultural observations from the 90's. This sweeping collection of topics covers major trends in music, TV, film, radio, sports, political moments, technology, and more. The decade was bracketed between the fall of The Berlin Wall (11/9/89) and the Twin Towers collapsing. It is the era of grunge, Seinfeld, the reunification of Germany, videotape, The X-Files, Bill Clinton, clear drinks, landlines and phone books, Ross Perot, The Phantom Menace and Jar Jar Binks, Art Bell and Coast to Coast AM, Waco, Columbine, Cops, hanging chads, Dolly the sheep, Michael Jordan, and so much more.

Looking back at the 90's through Klosterman's eyes is both entertaining and perceptive. His essays provide a shrewd and diverse look back at a time when you didn't have anything trending or going viral. If a story was a big news event, it really was news worthy. People living during this time were the last ones to know life before the Internet. If you remember the 90's, you will remember the sounds involved in dial-up internet service. You will also remember life before everyone had a cell phone and you depended on a landline where you never knew who was calling and had to answer the phone. You also were not connected all the time and could actually be unavailable. There were no binge watching shows. If you missed an episode, you had to wait for reruns. Video rental stores were huge.
Disclosure: My review copy was courtesy of the Penguin Publishing Group.
The review will be published on Barnes & Noble, Google Books, and Amazon.

The moment I saw this book, I knew I had to read it. I mean, my sister had that exact phone on the cover! I imagined it being nostalgic and funny and hopefully even a little thought-provoking. I was a child/teen during the 90s and was excited by the idea of experiencing the decade again as an adult. I hate to say it, but I was disappointed. It's more academic than I was expecting. This isn't necessarily a criticism, it's just not what I was in the mood for. I'm sure many people will enjoy this book, but I have a suspicion that it might be most enjoyable to Gen X, as that's who the author mostly speaks to.

"The Nineties" is an interesting study. It starts from the premise that the 1990s were the last era in which Americans could reasonably be seen as working from a common set of facts, even if the conclusions differed. Mr. Klosterman suggests that the pre-Internet era of the 1990s represented the last era in which news and entertainment were given to us en masse rather than curated. Yet, there's an implicit comparison between the Tv-native Gen X (i.e., the first generation to grow completely up with TV and thus more aware of what it was and wasn't) and the digital natives of Gen Z.

The book is written from an unabashedly Gen X perspective, contrarian and cynical (see the chapter on the Perot effect on the 1992 race),. Ultimately, he seems to be nostalgic for a world in which we weren't all plugged in 24/7 and where we didn't have the ability to pick and choose the news we heard.

Thank you Net Galley for providing an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review.

I went into this thinking it might be more of a fun nostalgic look back at pop culture and politics from the 90s and although there was some of that you have to wade through a lot of very heavy information too that I just could not get through.

Although there were some bits that did interest me as someone born in the 90s but who was too young to have much of an understanding of what was going on at the time.

A big thank you to NetGalley for this advanced readers copy of The Nineties by Chuck Klosterman! The book was very interesting going back through the decade. As someone who was born in the 90s, this book would resonate even more with people who were teens and adults during this time. Overall, it was a good read