IRB Intro #3: A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius

I generally try to stay away from "feel good" books with a tragedy that ultimately leads to a warm and fuzzy moral about the triumph of the human spirit--sentiment makes me nauseous. Due to this, I thought that A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius (just look at the title) by Dave Eggers would be the same type of heart-warming-turned-into-a-made-for-TV-Lifetime-movie memoir that I try to stay away from. However, after seeing the book crop up in various lists of top nonfiction reads online, I decided to check it out. The book is a "memoir" by Dave Eggers, but its clear that the book is trying to chew off more than the title memoir would imply just based on the reviews. The book is about Eggers' hardships as the sole guardian to his little brother after both of his parents died of cancer. While this sounds like the prime subject matter for soppy, sad, beach reads, apparently the book is rather known for its sardonic nature and bitter self consciousness. In other words, it has been likened more to David Foster Wallace than Jodi Piccoult. This makes me extremely interested in reading this book as I really do not know what to expect, and I hope to gain (perhaps) some moral or philosophical insight into the more human side of loss through reading this.