(no subject)
Feb. 27th, 2010 07:29 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
felis_ultharusSo in the vein of reviewing books, I don't think I ever talked about The Gum Thief, by Douglas Coupland - though I finished it months ago.
I liked it. I was told it was his best book in years, and that's true, though it's really two books. The first is an epistolary novel about a washed-up middle-aged man and the daughter of an old high-school friend of his who both work at Staples. The other novel is the one the main character is writing - a story called Glove Pond, about the world's worst dinner party (the name is the first thing he Googled that came up with no real hits).
The frame novel is okay. It's better than his other recent efforts. He's found his way back to his soul and his compassion again. His other recent efforts have so cold - Flanderized versions of his older work. He used to try and find the sacred in the modern world. Recently it's been more about fetishizing technology and anything new.
But he's looking for that soul again in The Gum Thief, which is good. It's a quirky friendship set in the nightmare of retail, and quite fun and warm at that. The scene set in a creative writing class made me laugh out loud.
Nothing he does in the frame story, though, holds a candle to the hilarious novel-within-a-novel his main character is writing. The world's worst dinner party makes the book a must-read. Watching the hosts try to salvage their pride and hide their wasted lives and poor domestic skills from their guests makes for brilliant dark comedy, and itself makes this a must read. If it has a flaw it's that it steals the spotlight out from the story it's supposed to be just a part of.
I have high hopes that Coupland's finally back in form. Future novels will tell, I guess.
In other news, there's a lot to look forward to this month - starting with return from![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
em_fish and sassysairs from Down Under, crossing both date line and seasonal divide to return home after the better part (or really, the worse part) of a year. I'm looking forward to seeing them again ^_^
I liked it. I was told it was his best book in years, and that's true, though it's really two books. The first is an epistolary novel about a washed-up middle-aged man and the daughter of an old high-school friend of his who both work at Staples. The other novel is the one the main character is writing - a story called Glove Pond, about the world's worst dinner party (the name is the first thing he Googled that came up with no real hits).
The frame novel is okay. It's better than his other recent efforts. He's found his way back to his soul and his compassion again. His other recent efforts have so cold - Flanderized versions of his older work. He used to try and find the sacred in the modern world. Recently it's been more about fetishizing technology and anything new.
But he's looking for that soul again in The Gum Thief, which is good. It's a quirky friendship set in the nightmare of retail, and quite fun and warm at that. The scene set in a creative writing class made me laugh out loud.
Nothing he does in the frame story, though, holds a candle to the hilarious novel-within-a-novel his main character is writing. The world's worst dinner party makes the book a must-read. Watching the hosts try to salvage their pride and hide their wasted lives and poor domestic skills from their guests makes for brilliant dark comedy, and itself makes this a must read. If it has a flaw it's that it steals the spotlight out from the story it's supposed to be just a part of.
I have high hopes that Coupland's finally back in form. Future novels will tell, I guess.
In other news, there's a lot to look forward to this month - starting with return from
em_fish and sassysairs from Down Under, crossing both date line and seasonal divide to return home after the better part (or really, the worse part) of a year. I'm looking forward to seeing them again ^_^