Rating: 
Summary: My favorite Nabokov
Review: Having read many Nabokov books, this is by far my favorite. It is simply delicious. It starts with a catchy line, and Nabokov never hides from the reader that the main character will have a bad ending. Cynical and well written, this book sometimes reminds me of Balzac's Eugene Grandet because of the perfection in the choice of words. If you see through his cynicism, you will find this book funny and enjoyable as well.
Rating:
Summary: My favorite Nabokov
Review: Having read many of his books, this is by far my favorite.
Nabokov does not hide from the reader that his main character will have a bad ending, even though at some point in the novel one feels he might have a chance.
This book is delicious. Nabokov's cynicism and his choice of words make this book near perfect. For those who are cynics, this book is very funny and enjoyable. Nabokov is very straight forward and this book is not hard to understand at all, and it is also not psychologically opressive.
For some strange reason, it reminded me of Balzac's Eugene Grandet, another one of my favorite books
Rating:
Summary: The best soap opera I have ever read
Review: I do not know if Nabokov meant this tightly written and wonderfully plotted noir to be a cautionary tale about adultery, but I do think that any married man who reads _Laughter in the Dark_ might think twice before starting an affair with a much younger woman. This book is a cross between _Lolita_, _Crime and Punishment_, with a sprinkling of "Double Indemnity," and is quite simply the best soap opera I have ever read.Albert Albinus is a married, successful art critic who meets and falls in love with a young, attractive, but low class girl who is an aspiring, but no talent actress. She cuckolds Albinus with a colleague of his who is also a deceitful and amoral opportunist. Together they victimize Albinus in one of the cruelist and most sickening ways I have ever read. Albinus' foolish sin begins with and eventually ends in tragedy. If I may loosely quote Ford Maddox Ford's _The Good Soldier_, "this is one of the saddest stories I have ever heard."
Rating: 
Summary: My favorite Nabokov to date
Review: Readers of Laughter in the Dark (originally published in English as Camera Obscura) seem to be divided in their opinions about the book. People either seem to really like it, or really consider it to be nothing more than a flawed version of Lolita.
I am one of the people who really like it.
I thought that the work he was doing with genre and character in this novel made it one of the most interesting to read. I liked the simplicity of the story-telling and its stripped-down nature made it extremely powerful. Besides his memoirs, this novel was the place for me where the quality of Nabokov's writing shone through the most.
Read it yourself to decide.
Rating:
Summary: Nabokov's best novel
Review: This is one of my all-time favorite books, and favorite Nabokov novel (though nothing comes close to his memoir, "Conclusive Evidence" -- now sold under the inferior title, "Speak, Memory; I loved that one so much I named my blog after it.) This book includes the usual Nabokov wit in every sentence, but it's also a deliciously fun read. Nearly all the characters are kind of bad, but not blood-curdling Humbert Humbert sort of way. These are people who fail despite themselves. And it won my heart with the first sentence. Try it out: Once upon a time there lived in Berlin, Germany, a man called Albinus. He was rich, respectable, happy; one day he abandoned his wife for the sake of a youthful mistress; he loved; was not loved; and his life ended in disaster. Gutsy opening, huh? But it's all in the telling.
Rating:
Summary: Nabokov's best novel
Review: This is one of my all-time favorite books, and favorite Nabokov novel (though nothing comes close to his memoir, "Conclusive Evidence" -- now sold under the inferior title, "Speak, Memory; I loved that one so much I named my blog after it.) This book includes the usual Nabokov wit in every sentence, but it's also a deliciously fun read. Nearly all the characters are kind of bad, but not blood-curdling Humbert Humbert sort of way. These are people who fail despite themselves. And it won my heart with the first sentence. Try it out: Once upon a time there lived in Berlin, Germany, a man called Albinus. He was rich, respectable, happy; one day he abandoned his wife for the sake of a youthful mistress; he loved; was not loved; and his life ended in disaster. Gutsy opening, huh? But it's all in the telling.
Rating: 
Summary: Lolita - Lite
Review: This is one of Nabokov's earlier books, published 22 years before Lolita. In many ways, the plot and feel of the two stories are quite similar (older man falls in love with younger girl who he idealizes, she doesn't love him but realizes her dependence on him, eventually ends in disaster). It's interesting to compare Nabokov's writing from one book to the other - Lolita is much more emotionallty intensive, challenging, has smoother and richer language, has more to say, and seems far less contrived than Laughter in the Dark. There's not so much to enjoy in Laughter outside of a pretty basic, well-written story. If you haven't read Lolita, buy an annotated copy and read that first, if you've already read it and are a fan of Nabokov's other works, definitely give it a shot, but with lowered expectations. A very good little book, just not a classic.
Rating:
Summary: Despicably delicious.
Review: This novel is noteworthy for two reasons: (1) This was the first novel of Nabokov's to be published in the United States, and (2) It marked the first occasion in which Nabokov used the English language in his published writings (he re-translated the novel for its American publication). But aside from these two points of technical importance the novel does not match up to the majority of the author's other works. The story of a middle aged man being duped, betrayed, and eventually ruined by a teenage seductress is handled much more convincingly in Nabokov's later work, Lolita. But still there are some redeeming features. The creation of the characters of Margot Peters and Axel Rex is a stroke of brilliance. Rarely have two more despicable (yet enjoyable) characters been given full reign to do their dastardly deeds: making a shamble of a man's life and thumbing their noses at social and moral conventions. The later scenes in the book, after Albinus is blinded in an accident, read like a Hitchcock movie screenplay as Margot and her lover, Axel, frolic openly in front of the now blind Albinus, who still thinks (now physically as well as emotionally) that Margot is still in love with him. And although these later scenes are the strongest part of the novel they also reveal its major fault. The book often reads like a screenplay, something that was intentionally written to appeal to Hollywood. Because of this, Nabokov's style suffers and the wonderful maniuplation of language that is so characteristic of this author is, for the most part, absent.
Rating:
Summary: A minor blip on the Nabokov scale of greatness.
Review: Vladimir Nabokov, Laughter in the Dark (Berkeley,
1938) Laughter in the Dark was Nabokov's first treading of
the ground he would return to almost twenty years
later in Lolita-- a middle-aged man finds himself
desperately desiring an underage nymphet coming off
her first love affair, and complications ensue. This may have been Nabokov's fifth novel (originally
published in Russia in 1932), but it has earmarks of
first-novel syndrome. He returns in some small part to
his subject matter in Mary (the renewal of the old
relationship amidst the new one) while seeing what
could be gotten from the then-shocking subject matter
of age differences in relationships. Unfortunately,
both Mary and Lolita are better-fleshed-out than this.
While it does pick up towards the end (the last third
of the book or so is right up there with some of
Nabokov's better work as far as sheer readability
goes), you may well be better off grabbing those and
reading them back to back. In the interests of amusement, note that the main
character (whose name is Albinus Kretchmer)'s new love
is said to have figured out his real name by checking
under R in a telephone directory. I'm still trying to
figure that one out. For Nabokov completists only. ** 1/2
Rating:
Summary: Beautifully written, extraordinary story
Review: What a lovely book. Strange and awful and amazing. The prose is beautiful and it was a joy to read. His best that I've ever read.
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