My son, Sam, tells me that he’s reading Shuggie Bain. Though they’re grown, I like to know what the kids are reading, much in the same way as, when they were younger, I paid attention to what they were watching on television. When they became enamored with The Sopranos, I watched it right along with them with my finger on the pause button; and every thirty seconds I’d pause the show and say, “This is not the way nice people speak to one another.” Or I’d say, “Never, never say that word.”
Thinking about The Sopranos reminds me of an amusing story about how, when we lived in Kuwait, the German in the downstairs flat kept getting fired from his jobs, and he seemed confused as to why. But I thought it was probably because his vocabulary was so offensive. And it turned out that, yes, he’d learned to speak English from watching The Sopranos. He had no idea that normal people didn’t sprinkle everyday conversations with obscenities.
Anyway, Shuggie Bain. I look it up. It won the Booker Prize last year. Richard Russo, one of my favorite authors, predicts that it will knock me sideways—though I question whether being knocked sideways is a good thing; but it must be or why else would the publishers have posted the review? On the other hand, being knocked sideways might be one of those ambiguous things someone says when he can’t think of anything that’s not insulting. But look—the Booker judges call it intimate, compassionate, and gripping. Wow! I am compelled to download it.
What the reviewers don’t say is that it’s a depressing slog through a nasty Irish bog. To sum up, an alcoholic woman’s adulterous husband moves her to a poverty-stricken mining village and dumps her and their young son there while he goes to live with his latest lover. When the little boy gets raped by an older boy I read no further. In the portion of the book I do manage to read, I come across not one kind soul or object of beauty. Every character is cruel and crude; every wall is peeling and moldy; and every landscape is smelly and bleak.
I hate to spend money on a book and then not finish it. But sometimes that’s just the way it goes. As to Richard Russo’s line about being knocked sideways, he’s a humorist that I’ve studied to the point where I’m almost as familiar with his work as I am my own; and I’m certain my interpretation was correct—while he was reluctant to slam a Booker prize winner, I can’t see him enjoying this laborious dragged-out moan.
Also, it’s my belief that what goes into our heads bumps around in there forever, influencing us in ways so insidious that we don’t realize it. So why deliberately plant ugliness in our brains?
To be fair, Sam didn’t exactly recommend it. He simply said that he was reading it. This happened to me once before when I mistook an off-hand comment for a recommendation when a friend told me that The House of Mirth was a must-read. She might’ve meant that it was an important read in the literary sense, not that I would find pleasure in it. In a nutshell, the main character, a young woman from a good home and with a hopeful nature, endures a decline in circumstances until she dies poor and alone.
As to the author, Edith Wharton, I can’t count the number of times people have said to me, “As a writer, you must love Edith Wharton.” Must I? Have I read anything by Edith Wharton? Maybe. I look her up and find that, indeed, I have read several of her books—but all the titles bring to mind are feelings of betrayal and oppression. No joy to be found. So no, I’m not an admirer.
My older son, Curtis, reading the remarks I make in the family email chain about how I disdain depressing novels, sends me a link to The Early Morning Riser, which The Washington Post says is the funniest novel of the year. Marian Keyes, another favorite of mine, says that The Early Morning Riser is “. . . very, very funny in a knowing wry way. . .”
Funniest novel of the year? Funny is what I write! These reviews stir my competitive nature. Okay, I think, Katherine Heiny let’s see what you’ve got.
Well, for one thing her last name makes me smile. When I was a little girl I had a friend who said, “My hiney!” the way other people said, “Boloney!” It was cute. And I, too, have a whimsical last name that leads to lighthearted thoughts. So we have that in common.
I analyze her work carefully. She adroitly contrasts solemnity and humor by presenting a tragic circumstance laced with absurd description or dialogue. She serves up clumsy or inappropriate remarks that lead to embarrassment or misunderstanding; and she uses amusing words like befuddled or confounded to illustrate how the main character is never quite in sync with those around her. Her dialogue flows naturally and her characters are audacious. She writes well and meets her goals and I will happily read her next book. This begs the question—does she leave me in the dust? Absolutely not. I do all the stuff she does; and I do it just as well if not better. Yet famous authors and notable publications are touting her. How can this be?
I received an email from a reader in the UK a couple of weeks ago asking when my next book will be out, which, believe me, is a question that looms so hugely in my mind that if I’m not vigilant it will consume me. A grad student in England recently wrote her dissertation based on the theme of materialism that runs through both my published novels. Since Old Buildings in North Texas and Why Stuff Matters were released, I have written six novels. Where are they? With my agent, who is presenting them with regularity. Who is she presenting them to? Who is reading my work? Is there any feedback? This lack of knowledge and control is the most frustrating thing about being a writer. I’m despondent to think that my lovely and funny Fran Furlow mystery series may never see the shelves, may never be enjoyed by anyone other than me.
However, reality offers bizarre distractions. Yesterday in the parking lot of Ross Dress for Less, I came across a pair of athletic shoes in pretty good condition sitting side-by-side on the yellow line, as though they’d been carefully arranged. What’s that about?
Seriously. Whose? Why? The shoestrings are clean and white and tied in neat knots. Is the cigarette butt a deliberate placement? If so, what’s it meant to convey?
