Love! this video…

James Frey. People love to hate him. People love him. He’s polarizing. I’ve never met anyone who is indifferent to him. He is the author of one of my top five books of all time (an always changing list though… but he’s been in there for a while), Bright Shiny Morning. I loved that book. Read it twice in a row. Sat in my backyard and drank gin and tonics and smoked my pipe and read into every single word like it had some kind of hidden meaning. Was wrapped up in the story… completely.
I loved that book because it made me think… So when I saw that he had a new book out, I was immediately excited to see what it was like. What story it would tell. How far would I fall in love with it in how little time.
I was excited. I couldn’t wait…

James Frey’s newest novel, The Final Testament of the Holy Bible, is a story about Christ’s return to earth. In the here and now. In modern times. In the inner city that is New York and its outlying sprawl.
The novel is told through the life and wanderings of the main character, Ben Zion, a troubled and unloveable Christ figure with a penchant for rampant and flagrant tantric sex, a love for hanging out with loonies, a constant communication with God during regular demobilizing seizures, and living like a bum in New York’s subways.
In The Last Testament…, Frey weaves an awkward and repetitive story about Zion’s life, obliquely copying the bible for the novel’s framework. Persecution. It’s here. Double crossing. Here. Blind faith. Here. It’s like a Bible checklist. Without the final cross finale and ultimate resurrection. Instead, Frey adds lots and lots of drugs and sex and video games and guns and hookers and all sorts of nasty shit that overall reeks of just being m’eh.
Part of the awkwardness is that each chapter is told from a different character’s view. Some are relatives. Some are friends. Some are acquaintances. Some ape the apostles while others are veiled persecutors. And each time I started a new chapter, I hoped that the book would finally get going. Like really going. Usually in this book, I just wanted to skip chapters. Some of the narratives are just plain boring.
I like looking forwards to reading a book. I love sitting down and getting ready to read, anticipating the story that I’m about to take in. Unfortunately, reading The Final Testament of the Holy Bible, I never felt this. Usually I was annoyed. I rarely liked or disliked the characters. I didn’t care for one chapter over the other. Was constantly in confusion because of the consistent repetition that made me feel like I’d already read certain chapters before I already had.
Frey is the king of repeating himself. Usually it works. In this novel, it’s a little like blind groping in a dark basement when you’re too young to know any better. Frustrating. Not leading to anything. Not knowing where it’s going. Tedious after a while.

Even with this book, I still love Bright Shiny Morning, and hope that it’s not his only opus.
I can only hope…
Better luck next time.

I don’t know… MIA was the shit for a few years… and now… she almost seems washed up.
What do you think of this song?
Lemme know!

I know it’s all played out and people are sick of her… but I love this song!

More here!

More here!

more here!

I never thought I’d post a Lykke Li video… but this one is SO dam catchy!

More here!

At long last, my novel is finally available in the Kobo store!
It would make an excellent preset for anyone and everyone on your Christmas lists!!
Here’s a link for your simplified holiday shopping!

Also, it is available on Amazon online, through the Apple App store, and many other outlets.
I hope you enjoy!

I tend to want to like Chuck Klosterman more than I actually do. I assume I like him. I’ve read most of his non-fiction essay collections (Fargo Rock City, Sex, Drugs and Cocoa Puffs etc…).  I find that usually they’re funny at the beginning then wander off lost near the end. Start strong and then fizzle… Kind sounds like me… ummm…
Anyway… yeah… and I did actually like his last novel, Downtown Owl. I just never thought about it afterwards.

Usually, I find that his writing tends to be like Douglas Coupland’s (who I totally respect immensely in all areas but stay away from his fiction). No one I’ve ever met talks like characters in either of these authors’ books. No one… which makes it hard to believe their writing as anything but a story. It’s hard to grasp such witty conversation when most of the conversations I’ve ever had in life sound nothing like them (which might just mean that I’m an idiot… but I’m not quite ready to admit that yet).

Anyway…

The Visible Man, Klosterman’s second novel, is a departure from predictability.

The novel is centred around Y____, and his therapist Vicki. Y____ seems to have a slight problem, and needs to get some things off of his chest. He can be, thanks to technology, completely invisible. Just like that. He can sit in people’s homes and watch them live their boring lives without them knowing. He can sit at a kitchen table and watch men arguing about science and observe how condescending they can be to one another. He can be a fly on the wall and do whatever he wants. He could do any number of evil and horrible things, but he doesn’t want to. All he wants to do is watch.
Doing this makes him feel guilty, and leads him to therapy.

What I enjoy most about this book, even though it is slow moving and told through Vicki’s notes of their therapy sessions, is that it’s a compelling read. Beginning with Y____’s anger that his therapist doesn’t believe that he can be invisible. His meandering tirades about nothing in particular. The unveiling of his secret gift. Vicki’s complete obsession with her patient once she sees (or doesn’t see) for herself that he can make himself invisible. It goes by quickly.

So, in a nutshell, I would really recommend this book. And now, in hindsight, I feel tempted to re-read Klosterman’s past works to see if there is something that I missed… Maybe… or maybe he’s turned a corner and has become an author that will have a huge future in fiction…

I hope so!

I do a lot of reading… especially at night before I go to bed. My nightstand is a teetering mess of books that I’ve read and others that are waiting to be read. I don’t care what anyone else says about books. How they’re dying and print is a dinosaur and how electronic publishing is the future. I still love books… always will… I love the feel of paper and losing my place and folding over pages and having sand fall out of pages of books I’ve borrowed…

People always ask what I’m reading, and rarely like what I recommend… but it never matters… because I love talking about books.
So… from now on, occasionally I’m going to do some posts, called From the Nightstand, which will be tiny book reviews, comments on stories, as well as book design and how it all fits into my life.

So see you next week for my first From the Nightstand post.

*update- all my reviews will be written in 5 minutes or less as well… so don’t worry about them being long… or good.

The best part is when Ice Cube says that he studied drafting… never rapped about that in NWA…

Love it anyway!