The NYC Underbelly

The Fuck Up by Arthur Nersesian

If the title of this, Arthur Nersesian's first novel, didn't give you a clue to the story that lay within, I don't know what would. "The Fuck-Up" really does say it all. Now that's not to say that the novel is in any way a train wreck, but the main character certainly comes close.
Through the eyes of this anonymous 23 year old male, the reader experiences - sometimes all too closely - the gritty underbelly of New York City.
The main character is reckless in a way very few are. Landing himself in increasingly bizarre situations based on chance encounters and overheard conversations, he takes opportunities anywhere he can get them. The world has hope and promise. And yet, just as easily as these glorious opportunities are found, they can be lost, sending him spiraling into an ever darker and more tangled web of lies, deceit and ruin. In short, he pretty royally f's things up.

The novel does well to depict an unglamourized view of the city, and urban living, with everything from the troubles of paying for emergency health care, to prejudices on sexual preference. You really get a taste for both New York itself, and the hardships it's citizens endure. Where the novel fails to impress, and what ultimately solidified the 2 star "it was okay" rating, was character.

Though sometimes pitiable, the character failed to truly pull my attentions, or better yet my emotions. I was astounded by the guts he had to take the opportunities he did throughout the narrative, but aside from that, when hardships arose, I found myself thinking well, what did you expect? Shady dealings lead to unfortunate outcomes in a way that had to be obvious from the start. It was easily annoying. Similarly, friendships lovers and coworkers fell flat in ways that although relatively believable, made it hard to attach to anyone, and therefore left little interest or remorse when it came to the general outcome of the character's lives.

Both hailed as a masterpiece by cult fans, and criticized by the wider public, The Fuck-Up has both it's merits and downfalls. Depicting the feel of NYC with acute precision, it's all about whether you can deal with the antics of a self-ruining 23 year old, or if, like me, you just want to give him a good shake and tell him to get a grip in his life. You make the call.

The Ghost Brush

The Printmaker's Daughter by Katherine Govier
In theory, The Ghost Brush, by Katherine Govier (which was evidentially later renamed 'The Printmaker's Daughter') had all the ingredients for a great story. An interesting and troublesome setting, relationships fraught with twisted ideals if love, duty, honor and dependency - rebellion, subversion, defiance, art, prostitution, poetry - everything was there. And yet...
Frankly the novel was rather boring. I liked Oei, the main character: painter, tomboy and devoted second hand to her somewhat dictator father. I also like Shino, the graceful sophisticated courtesan who is both mother and sister to the wayward young girl. The Old Man, Hokusai, around which the story truly revolves, is similarly intriguing in flawed, curious in both his genius, madness love and distinct lack there of for his family. And that is all well and good, but interest in a character only goes so far, an 'liking' an individual is but the first step for the reader. Readers want- they need- to care. Become invested. Feel.

Despite everything that seemed to set th novel up otherwise, I felt no connection to the characters. Sorrows took place, triumphs, hardships.. Friends and lovers came and went, and yet the mood and tone if the narrative seemed to remain the same - steadily unattached - throughout.

I am a painter, a writer and a lover of books. The context if the story could not be better suited, as the narrative follows the life of a painter and his artist comrades who toil on despite the looming punishments and restrictions of the Shogun & bakufu of early 19th century Japan, and yet I found myself as a reader struggling to connect.

Luckily, I was familiar with the historical context at least, having once upon a time studied Modern Asian History. Thus the important of Edo in the 1800's and the implications of the Shogun spies held further weight in the story, but it seemed there was a distinct disconnect between the history surrounding the novel and the way it was portrayed to the reader. Even having studied the terms and treaties I found myself unclear at times, and Govier seemed to work under a sense of assumption rather than explaining - even if only with regards to her characters - properly what it meant to love in Japan in those days.

That is not, of course, to say that all was for naught, merely thT that characters presented were not fully explored. The very fact that I wished to be let in to the lives of Oei, Shini and Hokusai suggests the merits of their character, but by not allowing the reader to dive into them as they read, the reader losses interest over time.

Similarly, though plot need not always be presented chronologically, the manner in which the characters move forward in time and space is disjointed at times, presenting information much later as only when the situation directly calls for it rather than laying a ground work of setting and understanding which the reader can build on as they progress through the story.

By no means a failure, The Ghost Brush stings more of unfulfilled potential - much in the way Oei remains an untapped well of talent - merely allowing for glimpses of that brilliance here and there, while keeping the rest concealed and hidden from any would-be audience. Picturesque, but lacking colour, The Ghost Brush is but the outline of a drawing, still waiting for the pigments to be filled in.


View all my reviews

Dorian

The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
I debated my rating between 2 and 3, for various reasons. It's not, let's be honest, the most enthraling of novels. But, for a classic, it isn't half bad. In the end, it boiled down to this: while the writing, narrative and storyline generally were not my cup of tea, dragging in parts with overly wordy an completely irrelevant explanations of beauty, there is a great deal of wit, cunning and hideous irony to The Picture of Dorian Gray. The concept, the undertones and the sinister mood which presides is excellent, and yet I found myself as a reader, wanting more, as though the surface had barely been scratched. Never-the-less the classic ideal of ageless beauty, juxtaposed with the haunting horror of grotesque sins has become an archetype all it's own in the infamous painting. A brilliant concept, the portrait holds its own within the novel despite its rather background setting. Pair this sinister presence with the clever banter that seems to so mark Wilde, and the potentially dry narrative gains the flavor and interest necessary to keep the pages turning. As stated, I would have liked to see the concept taken further and explored more deeply, but overall was left satisfied.


View all my reviews

The Tale for the Time Being

A Tale for the Time Being by Ruth Ozeki
Nao is the type of girl who immediately makes you here friend. Though an outcast, dislodged in time and space, and -within her own world - society, she writes with an honesty and sincerity that grabs hold of the reader and pulls them in. Nao and I were, from the start, friends. And she refers to the reader as such, as she goes along - writing to the invisible someone who maybe, just maybe, is reading her thoughts so many years down the line. For her it does not matter who, or when, merely that you are there.

Ruth, is a reader like us. Having found Nao's diary awash in the sea, she forms what she feels to be a unique and solitary bond with the unknown teenage girl, reading her words as though the very act my bring life to her - save her from what seems to be the inevitable tragedy of her life.
Both reader and writer need each other - giving each other purpose, and therefore life, and Ozeki uses this relationship to her advantage as we as the public readers gain a sense of purpose in our own reading of the novel.

Real, in both her pain and her triumphs, Nao is the inner self, in many ways, her ever wise and peaceful Jiko, the outer. and we are as Ruth, caught somewhere in between, desperate to pull both together and save each.

While the novel holds a nice level of mystery and what is -in my own opinion - the poetic tragedy of uncertainty in that Ruth will never know for certain who Nao is or was, and what became of her life, the novel takes a turn which alters this. As we progress, there is a sense of fantasy with regards to the very words on the pages of the diary - as they appear and disappear. For me, this was a flaw in the flow of the reader/writer connection for although it elaborated on the importance of one upon the other, it took away the authenticity by applying it to an un-real and therefore removed form. While ghost, powers, and mystery certainly have their place,e and were used effectively in the novel, this one inexplicable aspect seemed not only odd, but unnecessary, and thus diminishing.

Still an intertwined tale of human dependency, A Tale of the Time Being challenges questions of time, space, and human form as writing transcends these planes to pull people together.

Girlfriend in a Coma

Girlfriend In A Coma by Douglas Coupland

Coupland is, truly, an incomparable author. Strange to be sure, his followers and fans range in opinion over what makes his works master-pieces, or failed attempts. Girlfriend In a Coma, titled after the song of the same name by the Smiths, this 1998 semi-futuristic novel strikes a fine balance between the minute realities of life, and the cosmic tragedy of apocalypse and has been widely referred to as one of his finer novels. It is masterful how Coupland can target the very essence of mundane life within the teenage characters who ground and narrate the majority of the novel - following them through the struggles of teen years, aging, and coming to terms with themselves, while weaving an eerily futuristic and socially critical world of comas, dreams, and end times.

The novel is split between three major points in time, and is told through 3 different narraters.

The first is narrated by a character well known to the other characters of the novel, and yet never fully known by the reader. Jared, introduced post-humulously, narrates in the voice of a deceased 17 year old 'ghost' for lack of a better word. The novel then switches to the point of view of main character Richard, as he narrates life after the coma, and everything that follows.
Following sections are told without the use of a narrator, only to return, in the final chapters, to the voice of 'spirit' Jared, again, to round of the novel.

It is in both the plot and the narrative itself, then, that Coupland plays with this balance between what is ordinary and real, and what is fantasy. As stated in an earlier review from the Times, it is "a disturbing, thought-provoking and moving novel. Girlfriend in a Coma has something of the quality of a fairytale, but it contains a sharp realism that makes the book scarily contemporary" (15 May 1999).

It is this focus on the individuals - the somewhat 'every-man' quality of Richard, kind caring and lost within himself - and the realism inherent in mundane life, that prevents the story from flying from the page in a whirlwind of disbelief as conceptual elements such as visions, ghost narrators and global doom hang over the plot.

Coupland's strength, of course, is in capturing the spirit of everyday people, his characters ever believable, relatable and -though flawed- thereby loveable. We want desperately for Richard to succeed, and yet we revel in his faults and failures, seeing in him the very same flaws we too possess. His devotion, too, to Karen - and indeed Coupland's devotion and attention to a character that is, essentially, off screen for the majority of the novel - is both endearing and intriguing, as it shows a measure of love and kindness we as readers both long for, and would like to think we too possess. It is a testament to Coupland's writing that he is able to make the reader continue to love and care for Karen despite no direct presence. Merely a background character, silent, she remains the fixture around which the story evolves and collapses.

For me it is the relationships, the honesty, and the simple realities, that make this story. Adding in the Canadiana so often found in Coupland's work - Girlfriend In a Coma takes place in his own city of Vancouver - the story became all the more real for me as I related to names and places. His detail with street names and landmarks foster a sense of familiarity that although specific to an actual location, allows the reader to feel as though they know the place - it is their own home town - whether or not they have been there. I, at least, found this to be true. For although I am Canadian, and take pleasure in the (often uncommon in popular literature) Canadian setting, I've never been to Vancouver. And yet, I felt I had. Simple detail, pulling you in to the story, allowed for a solid foundation upon which the reader could stand and therefore more readily accept the more fanciful concepts that are the hallmark of Coupland's dystopias and criticisms of the modern world.

A fast, quick read, Coupland with have you both connecting with his endearing characters, and questioning the very format of the world in which you live. At once acutely real and vastly fantastic, the pages will continue to turn as you follow the halting, tragic and - occasionally triumphant band of friends struggling their way from adolescence to adulthood only to find its really one and the same.

“there are three things we cry for in life: things that are lost, things that are found, and things that are magnificent.”

The Hundred Year Old Man

My first, and only major qualm with The Hundred-Year-Old-Man was it's branding. On the back cover, (off my copy at least) is the tag line "it's never too late to start over". This implied a lovely story of a homely old man who suddenly decides though being aged beyond the average, he's ready for a bit of an adventure. mr Karlsson, however, is not an adventure-less homebody. A Swedish dynamite expert unwittingly tangled in politics, science and major events of history throughout the past 100 years, Karlsson's life was and and has been, remarkable. 

The novel writes with a wit and clarity that is both humorous and honest, immediately pulling in the reader as you learn about both Karlsson' current adventure - on the run from the senior's home whose window he's climbed out of - and his younger years, globe trotting and generally causing great pleasure and chaos all around him. 

A wonderful novel of character, friendship, and a great deal of history - albeit presented in an unusual (and dare I say far more interesting) manner, The Hundred-Year-Old-Man who Climbed out the Window and Disappeared is a great success of a novel, well suited to anyone looking for something a little off beat, quirky or down-right weird. Challenging both our ideas of age, and it's limitations, as well as the dichotomies of right and wrong, Jonasson blurs humour and tale with deep rooted realities and questions of humanity.

The fault in Our Stars

The Fault in Our Stars by John Green
Raw.
It's a word I admittedly overuse when i find a piece of literature that is, in fact, not over processed, overly pretentious or trying too hard - as books an do. The fault in Our Stars -which I finally succumbed to reading after much hype by blogging fans for ages - is raw in a very poignant way. The fault in our stars is certainly romantic, and in it's romance dances into the idealistic forms of love - I won't spoil it for potential readers, but there's a level of convenience inherent in the way romantic love plays out within the novel - but it does generally keep itself honest and real. Hazel Grace, our 16 year old main character, is a thoughtful, interesting - odd - but very much teenager main character. While her cancer makes her whole unique from your average teen, Green does a great job of exemplifying that she is, in turn, just as teenagerly, and just as much the same as any other non cancer inflicted individual. We are all human, finite, and experience pain and loss.
But the depth and clarity with which Green address cancer - the "suckyness" of it, the agony that really isn't brave, but breaking and sad - not tragic or poetic - just sad, adds so much merit to the tale.

While there are moments where Green pulls aspects of the 'cancer story' he is careful to tell Hazel's story - and individual tale of a young girl who happens to have a fatal disease, rather than the story of Cancer, featuring Hazel Grace. The novel itself focusing around this distinction, determined to illuminate the humanity and normalcy of people while at the same time taking nothing away from the sheer unfair awfulness that is growing up with Cancer. Hazel is real, she is 'raw' and she is likeable, even in her sometimes depressing realism. The reader immediately grows to like her, is invested, and I myself found the novel an exceptionally quick read.

A well written story of friendship and love, sickness, fatality and the coming to terms with the fact that we all, one day, must die. And while we may have but a short time together, that time - those moments, can be infinite.