Danger Darling

Vurt by Jeff Noon

Ahhh, Vurt. Jeff Noon, will you have my babies?

I read Vurt twice because I didn’t want the story to end. It was even more enjoyable the second time around. Written in a hacking, drug-induced style, the book follows a band of “Stash Riders” as they face danger, knowledge, pleasure and alternate planes of existence in search of the ultimate high — a feather called English Voodoo.

This is a book that can only ever be a book. No movies for you, Vurt; please don’t sell out to that Hollywood cheese. A huge part of its appeal is the way in which Jeff Noon conveys his imagery, shrouded in mystery and confusion and language.

On a scale of “Eh” to “FANFUCKINGTASTIC!” I give Vurt a “Wow, let’s have that one again, please!” Read it if you love words and a good story and illegal drug use isn’t an issue in your smoke-hazed mind.

Never Let Me Go by Kazuo Ishiguro

The bookseller at Waldenbooks told me that, although he’d never read Never Let Me Go, several people had told him that it was a difficult read. I don’t know that I agree with this view, but I can understand how some readers might come to this conclusion. Although there’s no terribly imaginative vocabulary and the storyline is refreshingly unusual, Ishiguro does nothing to explain his characters or the world he has created before he is ready. There are certain terms and conditions that simply have to be accepted without understanding as they’re read. This can be truly frustrating.

Unfortunately, I can’t reveal much of anything about the plot of this book without giving away the little secrets that are carefully tucked away and so casually mentioned that the revelation of each new detail is a surprise. The biggest disappointment was that I was left with so many questions. Kazuo doesn’t delve into the technical aspect of his book at all, choosing to focus entirely on the slowly dissipating hope of his main characters as they follow their preordained path through life.

Although I did like this novel, I’ll probably read it again in a month or so to see if I enjoy it more when I’m not searching desperately for clues to who the donors, guardians and carers are and why they exist. The hidden meanings were a little distracting, even though the craftsmanship of the novel itself was excellent.

On a scale of “Eh” to “FANFUCKINGTASTIC!” I give Never Let Me Go a “Hmm. Veeeerry interesting.” Read it if you like novels that make you think, but aren’t stuck up their own asses.

The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold

Drawn in by the beautiful turquoise cover, I picked up The Lovely Bones with some trepidation as to its storyline. The back cover blurb promised an affecting and emotional book about a murdered girl adjusting to her new life in heaven and the disintegration of the family she left behind. Afterlife? Heaven? That does not sound like a story I’m interested in reading. However, after picking up and rejecting several other books, I came back to The Lovely Bones and cracked it open to a random page:

“By the time the Gilbert’s dog found my elbow three days later and brought it home with a telling corn husk attached to it, Mr. Harvey had closed (the place I was murdered) up.”

An unattached elbow? This I have to read.

The Lovely Bones is less about life after death than about the lives people continue to live after a death. The heaven that exists in the book is merely a tool, palatable to nearly all tastes, through which Ms. Sebold relates the dead girl’s perspective narration on the world she no longer enjoys. It is well written, with subtle imagery, vivid emotion and language that never jarred me out of the experience. Too often, books are described as “haunting,” but this one truly is — both in the fact that it literally deals with death and the aftermath of such a tragedy and in the typical use of the word; this beautiful story returns again and again to my mind.

On a scale from “Eh” to “FANFUCKINGTASTIC!” The Lovely Bones ranks a solid “Hell yeah!” Read it if you want a fairly easy read with an intriguing plot or if you liked What Dreams May Come.

Bullet Park by John Cheever

On the surface, Bullet Park is a novel about one man moving to a suburb in order to crucify another man’s son. Paul Hammer, intent upon objectifying the very icon of suburban peace and joy to demonstrate how vile and depraved all humans really are, chooses his victim, Eliot Nailles, from a dental journal. Interesting enough, right? As I began to read, however, I discovered that the real story is in how delicate the balance is between normal and obsessive, sane and insane. The novel switches between first person narrative by the characters with relative ease, explaining their actions all the while through reflection and conversation. They seem to merely want peace, but are unsure how to go about acheiving it.

This book feels intensely voyeuristic and personal, like reading a hidden diary. John Cheever writes emotion with great clarity and a striving for truth, even if the truth is unlovely and tainted. Bullet Park is beautifully written in an almost emotionless voice, as though it could matter less whether a man’s wife cheats or his son is murdered.

On a scale from “Eh” to “FANFUCKINGTASTIC!” Bullet Park gets a “Very nice.” Read it if you want a relatively tame rendering of a brutal subject.

Aimee and Jaguar by Erica Fischer

Loaned to me by the ever lovely Di, I eagerly began reading the true story of Lilly “Aimee” Wust and Felice “Jaguar” Schragenheim, lesbian lovers living in Nazi era Germany. After reading for two days, I put it down and read an entirely different book. Then I went back to work on Aimee and Jaguar, intent on reaching the end of this important piece of GLBT literature. Unfortunately, because I had to take a break from this impossibly convoluted storyline every few days in order to finally finish, this book took me nearly two weeks to read and it felt like finishing a marathon.

Maybe it’s because I’m not a romantic.

Listen, kids, this book has the framework for a fiery explosion of a tale — Nazi Germany, an underground Jew in love with the ex-wife of a Nazi, concentration camps, lesbian romance in a time when homosexuals were being persecuted even more than usual — but the author merely buries the story with endless details and repetition.

In her epilogue, Ms. Fischer admits that listening to Lilly, the surviving half of the couple, describe her life and relationship to Felice was tiring. Many of her complaints about Lilly’s account of her life were the same I had about Ms. Fischer’s retelling. Lilly started tangential stories in which Erica was uninterested — check. Portions of her story sounded mechanical and rehearsed — check. Names, dates and tiny unimportant details are rattled off with confusing speed — check. However boring Lilly may have been (and from the looks of it, very) it’s the author’s job to reshape the story into something more interesting for the reader. I don’t feel that was done.

These issues aside, there are sections of the book that are riveting. Erica Fischer does break out some surprisingly intuitive writing in the epilogue. Aimee and Jaguar is a story worth knowing, if merely for the historical aspect. However, on a scale from “Eh” to “FANFUCKINGTASTIC!” it gets a “Boooooring!” Only read it if you’ve got a knack for keeping the seven nicknames for every character straight or if you can’t find the movie.

Fragile Things by Neil Gaiman

Short stories are my favorite. Tiny jewels just right for reading before bed and during commercials, they’re long enough to create interest without losing it in wordiness. Neil Gaiman is my favorite. His fanciful descriptive, his unique concepts and his solid writing make his work a joy to read. Short stories by Neil Gaiman? Literal heaven.

Containing thirty-one poems and stories, Fragile Things is a volume of things both delicate and indomitable. Each of them are delicious, but Feeders and Eaters, a nightmarish tale of flesh disappearing to an insatiable appetite, is by far my favorite. Least favorite? Diseasemaker’s Croup, which is a gobbledegook of medical nonsense. An added bonus to this book is the introduction, which explains the origin of each story. I love behind-the-scenes shit like that.

I’ll tell you this: Neil Gaiman can be my lesbian baby daddy any day. On a scale from “Eh” to “FANFUCKINGTASTIC!” it gets a motherfucking standing ovation. Neil — when you’re ready for the insemination, I’m available.

You can visit Neil Gaiman’s website at (surprisingly enough) www.neilgaiman.com.

Exquisite Corpse by Poppy Z. Brite

Let’s talk about Poppy Z., shall we? The girl is straight wrong. She needs some therapy, and I’m not talking about next week.

Exquisite Corpse is chock-full of grisly descriptions of the numerous ways in which death can be carried out, from disease to cannibalism to good ol’ throat slashing. Although Ms. Brite borrows heavily from the crimes of Dennis Nilsen and Jeffrey Dahmer, fiends we serial killer fanatics have heard all too often about, boredom wasn’t on my mind while reading this garishly bloody book.

At one point during my perusal, I actually had to set the book down for the evening. I’m not a squeamish reader — true crime and horror are particular favorites of mine — but the scene she painted of one boy’s demise was so gruesome that I couldn’t bear to read further. My best bud Dirk had warned me that Exquisite Corpse was “right to the edge” of what he could take, but I just thought he was being a pussy. (Sorry, Dirk.)

Gore aside, the book is well written and fairly captivating, if you don’t mind strident breaks from reality, coincidence that borders on prophetic and emo homos.

On a scale of “Eh” to “FANFUCKINGTASTIC!” I’d give Exquisite Corpse a “What the fuck just smacked me in the brain?!” Read it right before bed if you enjoy fun nightmares in which you get AIDS and die as some goth kid munches on your intestines.