Review from a Transgressive Fiction Fan
4th read: Reread because this is a strong contender for my dissertation. This read of it really troubled me for some reason and all of the freaky parts were 100% more freaky, and it was 100% more American gothic than I remember with all the coyotes wandering around killing pets and cars just driving off the end of roads into nowhere. The lack of friction between any of the characters is one of the most unsettling things about this book – people just relaying their internal monologues without really speaking or listening to each other. And all of the 80s music and culture references really freezes it in time so that you’re kind of encased in this social bubble where everyone’s devoid of morals and social interaction so they just self-destruct. It’s weird. But I love this book a lot.
“Insightful” Review from a Mainstream Reader
If you are a fan of good writing this book is not for you. The writing is bland and boring. If you are a fan of a good story then this book is also not for you, it’s boring and pretentious.
However if you are a fan of standing around at cocktail parties saying things like, “Ooh I love the nihilism of it and how he paints a landscape devoid of humanity and characters so emotionally dead that when they come to life you really get lost in the …blaccch!”
This stuff shouldn’t have been published. But there you go, neither should Fifty Shades of Grey.
What do I know?