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3.43 AVERAGE
3.43 AVERAGE
Not my favorite Douglas Coupland novel. I didn't feel the immediate connection with the characters, and the plot wasn't as intriguing as the others. Still, a decent read.
Douglas Coupland of 'Generation X' fame can be relied on to create disgruntled, misanthropic lead characters with a bit of heart and soul that allows the reader to love them nonetheless, because they see a little of their flawed selves in these characters.
Coupland does just that in this novel. The storyline revolves around a girl, Bethany, who discovers that her middle-aged colleague in an office-supply superstore, Roger, has been writing mock diary entries about her. More incredulous is the ensuing correspondence that ensues between them, while they pretend they are invisible to each other at work. As loopy as it sounds, the novel works, amazingly.
The structure of the novel is interesting, because it is made up of diary entries, correspondences and a work-in-progress novel by Roger. Dealing with metafiction can be a dangerous exercise for any author because it means you are drawing attention to your work as fiction, and being intentionally self-conscious about its relation to reality. When an author allows his character to write a novel, he needs to make sure it sounds convincing as the character's work, rather than the author's - very tricky business. The reader detects some tongue-in-cheek smugness when a creative writing instructor comments on Roger's work and comments that "a truly good author creates a novel so true it loses the voice of its individual author".
Thankfully, Coupland succeeds somewhat, in having Roger, a disillusioned middle-aged store associate (who is light years older than his college-aged colleagues)imitate unsuccessfully a Cheever-era domestic siting room drama.
What is captivating about this book is how successful Coupland manages to capture failure, a very self-reflexive venture that can overwhelm a less-confident writer. In the correspondence between Roger and his goth-maiden wannabe colleague, Bethany, Coupland manages to capture the distinction between the two voices and personalities.
Coupland does just that in this novel. The storyline revolves around a girl, Bethany, who discovers that her middle-aged colleague in an office-supply superstore, Roger, has been writing mock diary entries about her. More incredulous is the ensuing correspondence that ensues between them, while they pretend they are invisible to each other at work. As loopy as it sounds, the novel works, amazingly.
The structure of the novel is interesting, because it is made up of diary entries, correspondences and a work-in-progress novel by Roger. Dealing with metafiction can be a dangerous exercise for any author because it means you are drawing attention to your work as fiction, and being intentionally self-conscious about its relation to reality. When an author allows his character to write a novel, he needs to make sure it sounds convincing as the character's work, rather than the author's - very tricky business. The reader detects some tongue-in-cheek smugness when a creative writing instructor comments on Roger's work and comments that "a truly good author creates a novel so true it loses the voice of its individual author".
Thankfully, Coupland succeeds somewhat, in having Roger, a disillusioned middle-aged store associate (who is light years older than his college-aged colleagues)imitate unsuccessfully a Cheever-era domestic siting room drama.
What is captivating about this book is how successful Coupland manages to capture failure, a very self-reflexive venture that can overwhelm a less-confident writer. In the correspondence between Roger and his goth-maiden wannabe colleague, Bethany, Coupland manages to capture the distinction between the two voices and personalities.
dark
funny
reflective
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
My first Douglas Coupland. The plot is simple. Two very different people start corresponding through a notebook.
"Roger, a divorced, middle-aged "aisles associate" at Staples, condemned to restocking reams of 20-lb. bond paper for the rest of his life. And Roger's co-worker Bethany, in her early twenties and at the end of her Goth phase, who is looking at fifty more years of sorting the red pens from the blue in aisle 6."
As they write to one another, they start to reveal personal stories and experiences from their lives and come to appreciate each other and care for one another.
From my point of view, this book adresses a very common fact. That we judge "a book by its cover". That we judge a person by the way they dress or the music they listen to. This book proves that rather often, we couldn't be more wrong. A stranger can't possibly know what another person is feeling, what he, or she, is trying to hide behind that specific way of dressing or that particular behavior. After that book, I always think what others may hide, what they don't want revealed and what they might be afraid of.
Every one of us have a secret little world inside of us and we keep it from others in different ways. And who knows, maybe that's for the best. Maybe that's the only way we can go on...
"Roger, a divorced, middle-aged "aisles associate" at Staples, condemned to restocking reams of 20-lb. bond paper for the rest of his life. And Roger's co-worker Bethany, in her early twenties and at the end of her Goth phase, who is looking at fifty more years of sorting the red pens from the blue in aisle 6."
As they write to one another, they start to reveal personal stories and experiences from their lives and come to appreciate each other and care for one another.
From my point of view, this book adresses a very common fact. That we judge "a book by its cover". That we judge a person by the way they dress or the music they listen to. This book proves that rather often, we couldn't be more wrong. A stranger can't possibly know what another person is feeling, what he, or she, is trying to hide behind that specific way of dressing or that particular behavior. After that book, I always think what others may hide, what they don't want revealed and what they might be afraid of.
Every one of us have a secret little world inside of us and we keep it from others in different ways. And who knows, maybe that's for the best. Maybe that's the only way we can go on...
Closer to 3.5.
Another Big Lots bargain bin find. Doesn't really fit my around the world theme as much, even though the author is Canadian; aside from one or two references, the book could be from the United States.
Laugh out loud funny, but also quietly incisive, the book is told in epistolary format, mainly between Roger, a walking midlife crisis, and Bethany, who has put on a facade of Gothic facepaint several inches thick. They both work at Staples. Bethany finds Roger's work in progress, Glove Pond, a very Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf shoutout in prose, which starts the two talking.
There are some sly winks to the reader here, if you catch them. I think I shall hunt down more of Mr. Copeland's work.
Another Big Lots bargain bin find. Doesn't really fit my around the world theme as much, even though the author is Canadian; aside from one or two references, the book could be from the United States.
Laugh out loud funny, but also quietly incisive, the book is told in epistolary format, mainly between Roger, a walking midlife crisis, and Bethany, who has put on a facade of Gothic facepaint several inches thick. They both work at Staples. Bethany finds Roger's work in progress, Glove Pond, a very Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf shoutout in prose, which starts the two talking.
There are some sly winks to the reader here, if you catch them. I think I shall hunt down more of Mr. Copeland's work.
This book is comprised of letters between employees at a Staples; Roger, the older guy & Bethany the goth teenager. They write to each other in a notebook that also includes Roger's attempts at a first novel, a book called Glove Pond. Said Glove Pond is pretty spectacular & I can open almost any page in this entire book at random & hit some wonderful, lovely writing like, "I want it to look like I taste like almond paste," (which, coincidentally, was exactly what I wanted when I was a goth teenager), but I still found myself struggling to finish. Copeland doesn't quite do it for me the way he used to.
An easy and fun read - never dull and always full of surprises. A series of letters between some unlikely work colleagues undergoing their own struggles. Probably really tough to write and he made it look simple. Life affirming and just what I probably needed after a few heavy books. 4 stars.
emotional
funny
hopeful
medium-paced
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes