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3.29 AVERAGE
3.29 AVERAGE
dark
emotional
reflective
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
I really loved this book. I think the words, the sharpness, the perspective of the experiences and emotions evoked were really strong and moving. Could you laugh at some of the writing or should you wince was something often toyed with. I enjoyed the journey of this book and what was ultimately said by McCormack.
challenging
funny
interesting ideas but i feel like it could have been more fully realized. i think if i read more bersani maybe i'd be able to appreciate it better.
challenging
dark
funny
mysterious
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
This book is not just a book. It’s poetry and plastic and lots of shit. It’s an amusement park map and an upside down plastic castle. There’s bats in it and everyone is a faggot.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Cursing, Homophobia, Sexual content, Excrement
4.5 ⭐️ rounded up
this was so fucking good. just absolutely ridiculous, in the best possible way.
i absolutely LOVE books that play with formatting, that are experimental, transgressive — and this absolutely fit the bill. the spaces used in the beginning of the book, the use of repetitions (if u read my reviews u know i love that shit), and when i had to turn the book around in a reference to the upside down castle i actually think i swooned a little.
i will 100% be reading more from mccormack in the future. instant favourite.
this was so fucking good. just absolutely ridiculous, in the best possible way.
i absolutely LOVE books that play with formatting, that are experimental, transgressive — and this absolutely fit the bill. the spaces used in the beginning of the book, the use of repetitions (if u read my reviews u know i love that shit), and when i had to turn the book around in a reference to the upside down castle i actually think i swooned a little.
i will 100% be reading more from mccormack in the future. instant favourite.
When you read experimental, literary shit, there's a definite fear of looking stupid because you didn't get it.
This is a fear I have confronted on many occasions, so I have no problem telling you that I did not get this book. Like, at all.
I vaguely understood what it was, what it referenced, and the plotline, moment-to-moment action I generally understood. What I didn't understand was what this is about.
I've been really trying to explain how confusing this book was, and I think it's best said like this: If I wrote something like this, I don't know how I would know that it was done.
At what point do you step away and say, "Yes, that's it!"?
Maybe this is like that part of the art museum that some people really dig, where the art is like...there's this thing they had at the Denver Art Museum, it was part of a cultivator with a big skull on it or something. I guess you see it and feel things, but nothing definable, and what you feel and I feel are going to be totally different.
If you really like that part of the art museum, maybe this book is for you.
It's weird, I'm not someone who feels like art has to "do" something or be "for" a purpose or anything like that. It's more that I feel the writer's work is to show people something, and I'm not so sure I saw anything here.
I'm just not sure how to approach this as a reader or a writer, which are the two primary ways I look at books, and that leaves me with very little.
I googled a bit to read reviews other people had done, and I understood what they meant when they said things like "The blank frames in the book force the reader to be complicit" and stuff about the grotesque and everything. And I've felt that way about other books. But this one I think I just found a frustrating experiment, and at times I felt like this was a joke being played on me, like everyone was pretending this was a deep masterpiece and then you open it up and it's all potty humor. But, see, it's on purpose potty humor, it KNOWS it's being scatological (that's the fancy word for potty humor), so it's different.
I guess the biggest feeling I got reading this was that maybe this is a prank, and I fell into it. Maybe this is a huge prank on the literary world, and some folks are laughing their asses off at people grasping for deeper meaning in this text.
Or, maybe that's how this book functions: Intentionally shallow, and therefore the reader has to create the connections for themselves.
Or, maybe this book is about the fact that things don't always have deeper meaning, sometimes things just exist.
And where this ends up is me saying that the book could be interpreted any number of ways, and when a book can be interpreted in an unlimited number of ways, I have to bow out. That's not my scene.
This is a fear I have confronted on many occasions, so I have no problem telling you that I did not get this book. Like, at all.
I vaguely understood what it was, what it referenced, and the plotline, moment-to-moment action I generally understood. What I didn't understand was what this is about.
I've been really trying to explain how confusing this book was, and I think it's best said like this: If I wrote something like this, I don't know how I would know that it was done.
At what point do you step away and say, "Yes, that's it!"?
Maybe this is like that part of the art museum that some people really dig, where the art is like...there's this thing they had at the Denver Art Museum, it was part of a cultivator with a big skull on it or something. I guess you see it and feel things, but nothing definable, and what you feel and I feel are going to be totally different.
If you really like that part of the art museum, maybe this book is for you.
It's weird, I'm not someone who feels like art has to "do" something or be "for" a purpose or anything like that. It's more that I feel the writer's work is to show people something, and I'm not so sure I saw anything here.
I'm just not sure how to approach this as a reader or a writer, which are the two primary ways I look at books, and that leaves me with very little.
I googled a bit to read reviews other people had done, and I understood what they meant when they said things like "The blank frames in the book force the reader to be complicit" and stuff about the grotesque and everything. And I've felt that way about other books. But this one I think I just found a frustrating experiment, and at times I felt like this was a joke being played on me, like everyone was pretending this was a deep masterpiece and then you open it up and it's all potty humor. But, see, it's on purpose potty humor, it KNOWS it's being scatological (that's the fancy word for potty humor), so it's different.
I guess the biggest feeling I got reading this was that maybe this is a prank, and I fell into it. Maybe this is a huge prank on the literary world, and some folks are laughing their asses off at people grasping for deeper meaning in this text.
Or, maybe that's how this book functions: Intentionally shallow, and therefore the reader has to create the connections for themselves.
Or, maybe this book is about the fact that things don't always have deeper meaning, sometimes things just exist.
And where this ends up is me saying that the book could be interpreted any number of ways, and when a book can be interpreted in an unlimited number of ways, I have to bow out. That's not my scene.
challenging
dark
funny
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Content Warnings
gay, experimental fiction
3 / 5
Take a shot every time this book says faggot.
This book was absurd. I enjoyed the whole turn the page upside down and read right to left (page-wise) for some interaction but I think a lot of it was lost of me tbh. It was an easy read though and for that, I give it average marks.
Also enjoyed the random mention of Buffy in the dialogue after the novel ended. Agreed that Xander is the worst.
Take a shot every time this book says faggot.
This book was absurd. I enjoyed the whole turn the page upside down and read right to left (page-wise) for some interaction but I think a lot of it was lost of me tbh. It was an easy read though and for that, I give it average marks.
Also enjoyed the random mention of Buffy in the dialogue after the novel ended. Agreed that Xander is the worst.
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No