The Unliterate Review

“Conspiracy of Males” by Evan James Roskos is from Granta Online’s excellent New Voices series. To me this reads like a well-executed experimental sketch than a fully considered story, due mostly to Roskos’ use of the first person plural. The most recent, and most notable, use of the first person plural is Joshua Ferris’ And Then We Came To The End. But unlike Ferris, who used it to evoke a commiserative mood, Roskos uses it to underscore a sense of menace and paranoia:

“We hated your fat little face. We called you elephant. We called you Jupiter. We called you fat-ass. You asshole. Cocksucker. Dickhead. Shithead. Faggot. We beat you up in fifth grade, eight knees to your temple. You got detention because you were fatter than us. The principal, also the civics teacher, said we were too smart to start a fight with a big kid. How fair, how fair.”

A little unsettling, isn’t it? Definitely worth reading.

From my all-time favorite band: FUGAZI. This interlude is from Jem Cohen’s 1998 documentary on the band titled, Instrument. The song is called, “Break,” and it’s from FUGAZI’s sixth album, End Hits.

There a several things I love about this video: the shots of the fans, the mostly instrumental music, Ian MacKaye’s patented scream, and, most of all, Guy Picciotto’s DeNunzio-from-Caddyshack outfit.

Five Chapters is a unique literary website that publishes a new piece of original fiction each week, in five parts, one for each day of the week. They’ve published an impressive list of contemporary authors and artists such as: Nick Hornby, Chip Kidd, Rhett Miller (from the Old 97s), Aimee Bender, Nam Le, and many others. And despite it’s claustrophobic design, it promises to be an entertaining daily read. (Fortunately, each story comes with a “print story” link that provides a more reader-friendly page.)

This story, in particular, caught my eye: “Cardiology” by Ryan Boudinot. It’s a wonderfully inventive story about an entire town that shares the same heart. Ryan Boudinot is an exuberantly entertaining read, to say the least. Here’s what I mean:

“Years ago there was a town not far from here where nobody had their own heart. They shared one gigantic heart located in a former water purification plant near the center of town. When enlivened by physical activity, the heart beat more rapidly, sending its blood to the neighborhoods, rattling silverware on restaurant tables, shaking portraits off walls, tickling bare feet on cobblestones with its vibrations.”

The visual picture I have in my head of this town is something akin to one of Hayao Miyazaki’s (Spirited Away, Howl’s Moving Castle) creations, a world full of magic and strangeness, but still very mundane and familiar.

In “Cardiology,” Boudinot plays with a variety of archetypical themes: urban versus rural, the individual versus the collective, one’s sense of home, people’s dependence on technology, and the restraints of tradition. It’s a highly thought-provoking piece.

The 150-word Review: You might think that an “eco-thriller,” written in 1988, about environmentalists and toxic waste in the Boston Harbor might seem dated. Sadly, it does not. The Red Sox may have evolved from “hapless” to “mighty” and the media may have shifted from PCBs to CO₂, but when I came across Zodiac by Neal Stephenson, the premise felt extremely relevant.

Sangamon Taylor is an eco-vigilante (equal parts Jack Bauer and MacGyver), a one-man army taking on evil corporations with single-minded ingenuity. Eschewing bombs in favor of a souped-up inflatable boat and a gas chromatograph, he uses scientific evidence and media savvy to achieve his ends. When local lobsters register catastrophic PCB levels, Sangamon uncovers an audacious toxic crime that could turn Boston Harbor into a “harbor of death.” While Sangamon Taylor is not his most compelling hero/protagonist, Stephenson creates an engaging novel, where hard science becomes the star of the show.

You will enjoy this book if you are a fan of: dust-head heavy metal Satanists, daredevil Zodiac maneuvers, Duck Squeezers, ungodly stink bombs, mediapathic escapades, nighttime bicycle jaunts, Greenpeace, sewer diving, benzene rings and covalent chlorine, cigarette boats, and nitrous oxide.

Clavinism (stuff that will not make you look cool in a bar): Actually Norm, Sangamon Taylor is modeled after environmental chemist Marco Kaltofen.

The 150-word Review: There are moments in The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao where Díaz’ street-wise, ghetto-nerd pyrotechnics fall away, where substance transcends style, and the authenticity of his characters shines: Lola’s story, Beli’s three loves, Abelard’s tragedy, Oscar’s final days in Santo Domingo. Long before Oscar Wao, Díaz cultivated this kernel of authenticity in the soil of his 1996 collection, Drown.

Shifting from a dusty campo in Santo Domingo to a crack house in New Jersey, Drown contains ten stories that read like snippets from a larger narrative. The victim of a brutal unprovoked attack in “Ysrael” returns in “No Face” to give us a glimpse into his daily life. A young man remembers “holding on” during his father’s abandonment in “Aguantando” then, in “Negocios,” he imagines his father’s lonely, frustrating struggle in America. In Drown, Díaz’ narrative subject is the immigrant, existing in two different worlds and belonging to neither.

You will enjoy this book if you are a fan of: childhood bullies, sibling disputes, the first days of blunted-out adult independence, crack head girlfriends, summers at the pool, remembering childhood parties and watching the adults dance, fighting for a tenuous grip on the bottom rung of the American dream, fathers and mothers, and adolescent sexual fumblings.

Clavinism (stuff that will not make you look cool in a bar): Actually Norm, “Yunior” is Junot Díaz’ family nickname.