Take a photo of a barcode or cover
A review by jgnoelle
Generica by Will Ferguson
3.0
This is a book I would never have chosen on my own to read, if for no better reason than the fact that it’s satire. The trouble with satire is that if you and the author have differing opinions on what's funny, you're pretty much setting yourself up for disappointment.
I read this book at the recommendation of a good friend who believed that because much of the action takes place in a publishing house and because I'm interested in pursuing traditional publication, the fit was natural. The story's not by any means a how-to for getting published, though; quite the contrary, it's more so almost a cautionary tale about the dangers or publishing the wrong thing, or otherwise the right thing at the wrong time.
Generica the the story of embittered, browbeaten, Generation X editor, Edwin de Valu. Edwin works in the self-help book department at Panderic Publishing, which is styled as being among the Big Five (Four? Three?) New York publishers with whom Panderic is in constant competition. When Edwin is ordered by his pretentious, baby boomer boss to quickly find a new self-help book to publish to fill the spot of a long-time author who was recently arrested, Edwin innocently publishes a book from the slush pile that is the mother of all self-help books, containing advice on every human failing and shortcoming known to man. And the book works, to the point that life and society as we know it is irrevocably (and more or less comically) changed forever by the epidemic of Happiness(tm) that results, leaving only Edwin to try to save the world from itself.
Satire as a genre ultimately seeks to offer commentary on society. As stated on the book jacket, author Will Ferguson wrote Generica as a vehicle for examining the obsession with self-help and the pursuit of constant happiness in the United States. To do this, the book is populated with a cast of quirky characters and at times over-the-top situations that didn't totally resonate with me. This might have more to do with the medium than the story or the writing itself: Seinfeld remains one of my favourite TV shows of all time, but I'm not convinced it would have been nearly as funny as a novel or series of novels.
It wasn't until the book became a bit more serious with an increasingly harried and misanthropic Edwin explaining why perpetual Happiness(tm) is so harmful that to story started to speak to me. Author Ferguson provides several very quotable passages about how the yearning for an unattainable something more is the driver of ambition and creation and the hallmark of what makes us human, and that actual self-actualization is futile, although the ongoing attempt is vital to modern society and our ability to experience joy, however fleeting, at all.
He then argues against his own point a bit, discussing how the fatal flaw of humanity is the generation of happiness through wealth and material things instead of the generation of wealth through happiness. This counter-argument serves to show how the true nature and needs of humanity is no easy thing to pin down, and how several opposing ideas and states of being can simultaneously be true.
But then in the end, he losses me, and as a result, losses a star from what would have been a four-star review for making me think despite not really making me laugh. He trades ambiguity and depth for brashness and an appeal to the lowest common denominator, positing the notion of the brash, thrill-seeking, hard-living hellraiser as the solution to dissatisfaction and the desire for self-actualization.
In short, in seeking to critique one American ideal, Ferguson winds up elevating yet another that’s seemingly no less damaging.
I don't at all agree that life is such a series of extremes between stagnant, insipid happiness and wanton self-destruction, or that the hellraiser is the defining characteristic to which we should all aspire to give our lives meaning. Ferguson would have done better with this book to simply present all possible sides of the issue and leave it up to the reader to draw his/her own conclusions.
I read this book at the recommendation of a good friend who believed that because much of the action takes place in a publishing house and because I'm interested in pursuing traditional publication, the fit was natural. The story's not by any means a how-to for getting published, though; quite the contrary, it's more so almost a cautionary tale about the dangers or publishing the wrong thing, or otherwise the right thing at the wrong time.
Generica the the story of embittered, browbeaten, Generation X editor, Edwin de Valu. Edwin works in the self-help book department at Panderic Publishing, which is styled as being among the Big Five (Four? Three?) New York publishers with whom Panderic is in constant competition. When Edwin is ordered by his pretentious, baby boomer boss to quickly find a new self-help book to publish to fill the spot of a long-time author who was recently arrested, Edwin innocently publishes a book from the slush pile that is the mother of all self-help books, containing advice on every human failing and shortcoming known to man. And the book works, to the point that life and society as we know it is irrevocably (and more or less comically) changed forever by the epidemic of Happiness(tm) that results, leaving only Edwin to try to save the world from itself.
Satire as a genre ultimately seeks to offer commentary on society. As stated on the book jacket, author Will Ferguson wrote Generica as a vehicle for examining the obsession with self-help and the pursuit of constant happiness in the United States. To do this, the book is populated with a cast of quirky characters and at times over-the-top situations that didn't totally resonate with me. This might have more to do with the medium than the story or the writing itself: Seinfeld remains one of my favourite TV shows of all time, but I'm not convinced it would have been nearly as funny as a novel or series of novels.
It wasn't until the book became a bit more serious with an increasingly harried and misanthropic Edwin explaining why perpetual Happiness(tm) is so harmful that to story started to speak to me. Author Ferguson provides several very quotable passages about how the yearning for an unattainable something more is the driver of ambition and creation and the hallmark of what makes us human, and that actual self-actualization is futile, although the ongoing attempt is vital to modern society and our ability to experience joy, however fleeting, at all.
He then argues against his own point a bit, discussing how the fatal flaw of humanity is the generation of happiness through wealth and material things instead of the generation of wealth through happiness. This counter-argument serves to show how the true nature and needs of humanity is no easy thing to pin down, and how several opposing ideas and states of being can simultaneously be true.
But then in the end, he losses me, and as a result, losses a star from what would have been a four-star review for making me think despite not really making me laugh. He trades ambiguity and depth for brashness and an appeal to the lowest common denominator, positing the notion of the brash, thrill-seeking, hard-living hellraiser as the solution to dissatisfaction and the desire for self-actualization.
In short, in seeking to critique one American ideal, Ferguson winds up elevating yet another that’s seemingly no less damaging.
I don't at all agree that life is such a series of extremes between stagnant, insipid happiness and wanton self-destruction, or that the hellraiser is the defining characteristic to which we should all aspire to give our lives meaning. Ferguson would have done better with this book to simply present all possible sides of the issue and leave it up to the reader to draw his/her own conclusions.