Scan barcode
juliabingel's review against another edition
dark
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Addiction, Drug abuse, Mental illness, Sexual harassment, Sexual assault, Rape, and Drug use
Moderate: Abortion
blakezissman's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
namesjitz's review against another edition
dark
relaxing
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
2.5
boguey's review against another edition
3.0
I enjoyed Denis Johnson's collection of stories. He deftly manipulates our grasp of temporality and invites us to get to know these fill-in-between-the-lines characters who could be anyone, anywhere. Johnson succeeds in creating a world that is at once very real and other-worldly. I have since also read Train Dreams, which, while a very different story, represents something of an evolution. I look forward to more of his work.
tittypete's review against another edition
2.0
Junky fuck up stories obscured by artsy-fartsy dreamy meanderings. It was cool sometimes ('Work') but other times I found myself glazing over and losing the plot even during the shortest of 'stories'. I know this is on me. I am decidedly uncomplex. It's something I'm working on. But in the end this was kind of a shrug.
donasbooks's review against another edition
5.0
Denis Johnson was no stranger to mental illness and addiction, a reality which was obvious in his writing. As was the reality that he also wrote drama and poetry, as his prose is incredibly beautiful. That he wrote with honesty about mental illness was clear, but so was his sympathy. He never judges the characters in his book, and these are some hard characters to like -- a peeper, a wife beater, worse even. In my notes I wrote how much I dislike the speaker by the end of the collection, as the stories maintain the same speaker throughout. But I felt bad; I wished I maintained the same sympathy as Johnson had in his writing.
Part of the reason Johnson wrote with such sympathy for the speaker is because the speaker's vulnerability is complete. Because of the tone Johnson manages to strike, the reader can believe the speaker when he tells us things that no one would ever admit, maybe even to himself. It's quite brilliant.
The way Johnson uses the same speaker for all of the stories is just one small way he use fictional time to connect all the stories in the collection. Just from the speaker's perspective, there's the macro level, that he's always the speaker, and then there's the micro instances of clever movement of time, such as this passage from "Emergency" (pgs 84-5): "The bunnies weren't a problem yet, or they'd already been a problem and were already forgotten, and there was nothing in mind." Manipulating time in fiction, either for the characters or the reader directly, is very smart fiction, and makes for a thrilling read.
We see more of this on the micro level in "Car Crash," in which Johnson manages to disperse through the characters the right, spare, perfectly described details of the wreck to convey the perfect level of clarity and horror of the scene. Johnson rendered this scene perfectly. Also in this story, readers encounter a macro level time manipulation when a character named Hotel dies. But in the next story in the collection, Hotel is alive and well in a story called, "Dundun." This element of time manipulation could be analyzed from a number of different perspectives, but I think it's simple. As a symbol, I think it's meant to highlight the immutability of time for addicts and the severely mentally ill. I also think it's an excellent fiction device and Johnson knew it.
We really value the surprise ending in the book and movie worlds, but I think that a well done unexpected plot point at any place in a story is good fiction, and Johnson is quite good at these. He can turn a story on it's ear. Given the context of the book, perhaps he's saying something about drugs, like when the inebriated orderly removes the knife from the patient's face on pgs 75-6, successfully, while the doctors are still sitting around discussing the case, for example -- that's scene is not just funny, it's a bit heart-stopping!
It's never far from the mind that Johnson was also a poet and dramatist. In certain sections, the prose becomes notably poetic. It's always incredibly effective -- I'll never forget the description of the Savoy (pgs 99-100) -- at the location at which it occurs. My notes have a page completely filled with Johnson's descriptions I found passingly beautiful. Such as "Midwestern clouds like great gray brains" (pg 5) and, "That sudden crispness, and all the tang of evergreen stabbing us!" (pg 80). Please don't let me go on.
I love how the stories in this collection show the real nature of things. In "Emergency," the addicts are the medical workers. Not the cafeteria workers or janitorial staff. And the man who came in because his wife stuck a knife in his face doesn't want the police. "Not unless I die," he says (pg 73). These characters, like most of Johnson's characters, like real people, are always just about normal -- right up until the moment they do something twisted. Like the moment in "Dirty Wedding" that the speaker harangues his girlfriend, recovering immediately after a difficult gynecological operation, with jealous accusations about the actual procedure -- "What did they stick up you?" (pg 94) And the moment when the speaker goes from innocuously riding the el to suddenly stalking a stranger over some meaningless coincidence (p 96).
This is seriously one of the finest pieces of writing I've ever read. It's now one of my top ten. And I can't really even enjoy the stories because they're about mental illness, which gets too real for me. I hope I absorbed the lessons on writing to be found in the book. I recommend it for all writers, poets and small fictionists especially. I recommend it for readers who like Jack Kerouac, Hunter S. Thomson, Sylvia Plath, Tobias Wolff, Flannery O'connor.
Part of the reason Johnson wrote with such sympathy for the speaker is because the speaker's vulnerability is complete. Because of the tone Johnson manages to strike, the reader can believe the speaker when he tells us things that no one would ever admit, maybe even to himself. It's quite brilliant.
The way Johnson uses the same speaker for all of the stories is just one small way he use fictional time to connect all the stories in the collection. Just from the speaker's perspective, there's the macro level, that he's always the speaker, and then there's the micro instances of clever movement of time, such as this passage from "Emergency" (pgs 84-5): "The bunnies weren't a problem yet, or they'd already been a problem and were already forgotten, and there was nothing in mind." Manipulating time in fiction, either for the characters or the reader directly, is very smart fiction, and makes for a thrilling read.
We see more of this on the micro level in "Car Crash," in which Johnson manages to disperse through the characters the right, spare, perfectly described details of the wreck to convey the perfect level of clarity and horror of the scene. Johnson rendered this scene perfectly. Also in this story, readers encounter a macro level time manipulation when a character named Hotel dies. But in the next story in the collection, Hotel is alive and well in a story called, "Dundun." This element of time manipulation could be analyzed from a number of different perspectives, but I think it's simple. As a symbol, I think it's meant to highlight the immutability of time for addicts and the severely mentally ill. I also think it's an excellent fiction device and Johnson knew it.
We really value the surprise ending in the book and movie worlds, but I think that a well done unexpected plot point at any place in a story is good fiction, and Johnson is quite good at these. He can turn a story on it's ear. Given the context of the book, perhaps he's saying something about drugs, like when the inebriated orderly removes the knife from the patient's face on pgs 75-6, successfully, while the doctors are still sitting around discussing the case, for example -- that's scene is not just funny, it's a bit heart-stopping!
It's never far from the mind that Johnson was also a poet and dramatist. In certain sections, the prose becomes notably poetic. It's always incredibly effective -- I'll never forget the description of the Savoy (pgs 99-100) -- at the location at which it occurs. My notes have a page completely filled with Johnson's descriptions I found passingly beautiful. Such as "Midwestern clouds like great gray brains" (pg 5) and, "That sudden crispness, and all the tang of evergreen stabbing us!" (pg 80). Please don't let me go on.
I love how the stories in this collection show the real nature of things. In "Emergency," the addicts are the medical workers. Not the cafeteria workers or janitorial staff. And the man who came in because his wife stuck a knife in his face doesn't want the police. "Not unless I die," he says (pg 73). These characters, like most of Johnson's characters, like real people, are always just about normal -- right up until the moment they do something twisted. Like the moment in "Dirty Wedding" that the speaker harangues his girlfriend, recovering immediately after a difficult gynecological operation, with jealous accusations about the actual procedure -- "What did they stick up you?" (pg 94) And the moment when the speaker goes from innocuously riding the el to suddenly stalking a stranger over some meaningless coincidence (p 96).
This is seriously one of the finest pieces of writing I've ever read. It's now one of my top ten. And I can't really even enjoy the stories because they're about mental illness, which gets too real for me. I hope I absorbed the lessons on writing to be found in the book. I recommend it for all writers, poets and small fictionists especially. I recommend it for readers who like Jack Kerouac, Hunter S. Thomson, Sylvia Plath, Tobias Wolff, Flannery O'connor.
kathrinpassig's review against another edition
4.0
Wegen dieser Rezension gelesen: https://www.piqd.de/literatenfunk/denis-johnson-jesus-son
Unklar, warum die Empfehlungstools von Amazon und Goodreads mir die Existenz von Denis Johnson verschwiegen haben.
Unklar, warum die Empfehlungstools von Amazon und Goodreads mir die Existenz von Denis Johnson verschwiegen haben.
teenagelightning's review against another edition
5.0
amazing.
why do I like reading about dirtbags so much?
why do I like reading about dirtbags so much?
geva1108's review against another edition
dark
funny
fast-paced
4.0
Everyone knows that this is Denis at his best, but now I know it too. Reading short stories by a poet—! It’s like watching slalom on TV. What a thrill, all the language. I especially appreciate bum lit. I think I dated this guy a few times over in my hometown. The first and last stories were especially memorable, which makes sense and was maybe the publisher’s idea, but it does make me wonder if there was a rush to get through some of the middle bits. Anyway, this is leagues better than Train Dreams, which for some reason I read first many years ago and gave to an ex who said he wanted to read more (I gave him all the books I didn’t like, since he didn’t know the difference anyway). I think this and Bad Behavior are in my top 2 story collections. Denis! What a job.
noahpowers's review against another edition
dark
emotional
funny
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0