Review: 'Black Jesus' by Simone Felice

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Black Jesus is Simone Felice's latest novel, published by Allen&Unwin this year. The fact that the book is published by A&U, an Australia-based publisher, while the writer himself lives in the Catskill Mountains in New York State, arguably the backyard of the largest English-language publishing hub in the world, New York City, is perhaps indicative of the novel itself. 

The story, centred around a marine, who returns home from Iraq blinded, named Lionel White, or 'Black Jesus' (his marine nick-name)and a woman named Gloria/Desiree who flees to the Catskills where Black Jesus' home is, to get away from a (very) abusive partner in LA. It is fate that brings the two together at Lionel's mothers flea market - a meeting that helps them both find their centre and redemption through a renewed belief in reality. 

I do not wish to go too far into the story - the outline above gives you the premise, but it is Felice's language that will draw you in. He has the power of making the mundane and drab into the poetic and exciting. For the sake of comparison, the book reads as a bastard-child of DBC Pierre's 'Vernon God Little' and Mitch Cullin's 'Tideland', mixing black humour with a southern gothic edge. 

I read this novel in an evening, effortlessly letting the story wash over me. You care for all characters, all beautifully flawed, and the story stays fresh and keeps moving. The only criticism I have is the about the inclusion of the useless side-story involving Gloria/Desiree's ex after she has left him - it adds nothing to the novel as a whole and, in fact, distracts from the main story-line and could be cut without leaving any kind of gaps. That said, this is a great read, and I highly recommend it. Apart from the lovers of, obviously, DBC Pierre and Mitch Cullin's 'Tideland' anyone who likes a dark quirky story will enjoy this novel.

 

Review: Starfucking Hipsters, 'From the dumpster to the grave'

This album bores me. Which surprises me. I've loved nearly everything STZA has done so far, from Choking Victim to Leftover Crack and now the Hipsters. The first 2 hipster albums were great adding a sense of melody to the crusty ska-sounds of the preceding 2 acts. Both albums had coherence as a unit, leading the listener through the record. I lose attention listening to 'from the dumpster to the grave' half-way through each and every time. Which makes me sad. I really wanted to like this album and listened to it a number of times over a few weeks, but no dice. Musically the album is all over the place, hopping uselessly between genres, from ska to metal to rap, which previously they were able to do, but on this occasion completely miss. The use of three different female vocalists is distracting, even though they're good, and when they throw in a rapper halfway through the album, you've lost me.

This is aside from the politics, which gets more and more obscure with each album. The conspiracy theories STZA spouts, centering around killing cops and 9-11'inside-jobs' and FEMA camps, are not so different from leading theories currently promoted by the militia and sovereign citizen movements, making me feel very uneasy.

Musically they've lost me and that combined with their questionable politics has me tune out and turn off. Shame.

Behold the weird starfucking rapness....

Richard Brautigan

I am currently reading Richard Brautigan's 'Sombrero Fallout' (1976) - an incredible surreal novel where two story lines intertwine - a story about a sombrero fallen from the sky is half-written, then ripped up and thrown in the waste basket, where it, unbeknownst to the author, continues to 'live' and develop into a catastrophic chain of events - the other story line is that of the writer, who ripped up the first story, who pines after his lost love. Written in short bursts, tiny chapters, it is absurdist black humour, while at the same time displaying the real pain of the author-character - who presumably is Brautigan, was briefly married to a Japanese woman, Akiko Yoshimura, although strangely enough, if Wikipedia is right, that would have been after he wrote this book. Perhaps he was with her for a while - it turned sour - then they found each other again? 

Anyway, I am reviewing a book before I have even read it completely - I just want to tell you that this one is worth a read - as seems all of Brautigan's stuff. 'Trout fishing in America' is great - as is 'A Confederate General in Big Sur'. 

Brautigan also recorded an album - which is worth a listen, maybe two. It is long out of print, but if you hunt around for it you should be able to find it on some sort of blogspot - the title is 'Listening to Richard Brautigan' - go fetch!


It has this beauty of a poem on there: 

REVIEW: Map of the Invisible World - Tash Aw (2009)

http://www.harpercollins.com.au

Tash Aw's second novel 'Map of the Invisible world' is a great story set in Indonesia turbulent 1960s.

Two Indonesian brothers are separated when young. The older brother, Johan, is taken, from their orphanage on a remote island, to Malaysia by a rich couple, the younger, Adam, is adopted by a Dutch painter who lives in a coastal town in Indonesia. 

Adam tries to remember his brother, but he always stays out of focus, like a faceless figure in the corner of his eye, no matter how hard he tries. His upbringing by Karl, the painter, is full of love, but paradoxical. Karl wants nothing else than to be Indonesian, but his white skin in the post-colonial Indonesia of the early 1960s forbids these aspirations. It is a time of clashes between the PKI (Indonesian Communist Party) and the government and its armed forces. President Sukarno is trying to juggle these powers and keep Indonesia safe and under control. 

Johan remembers all too well and has become nihilistic, with more money than he can spend and the indifference from his adoptive father, he runs across the newly developing capital of Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, looking for peace.

Around Adam's 13th birthday things spin out of control, when Karl is taken prisoner by the Indonesian government, accused of being a communist spy. This, of course, is a false accusation. He is taken to Jakarta and thrown in jail. Left alone Adam goes through old pictures Karl kept. He finds photos of a woman, an important friend of Karl, he figures. He decides to travel after his father to Jakarta and ask this woman for help. 

-----

'Map of the invisible world' is beautiful novel that weaves historically important events in the young Indonesian Republic and a personal story of two lost brothers together.  Tash Aw manages to include in the book: A meeting with Sukarno; keen insights into the political interests of the US in Indonesia; the feeling of the Indonesians during these times. You come so close to the streets of Jakarta that you can almost smell it.

This is a beautiful book and, like Light Boxes and American Rust, it is one of the best books I have read in 2010.  The only criticism I have is that, while the story-line about Johan is written well, it is never properly followed through and the novel would have stood just as well without Johan's story on the other side of the Malacca Strait. 

Let me know what you think of it.

Joran C.A. Monteiro © 2010

REVIEW: American Rust - Philipp Meyer (2009)

(www.randomhouse.com and
 philippmeyer.net)

Set in the impoverished coal country of contemporary Pennsylvania, ‘American Rust’, Philipp Meyer's debut novel, is the story of Isaac English and Billy Poe whose lives spiral out of control when they get caught up in a murder. Friendship and self-preservation become juxtaposed as both young men need to come to terms with the end of their adolescence. 

As with Steinbeck’s ‘The Grapes of Wrath’. ‘American Rust’ is set in a period of economic depression. Like the Oklahoma ‘refugees’ in ‘The Grapes of Wrath’, the inhabitants of this Pennsylvania valley, the heart of the American steel industry, were never rich, but also they were never poor. But now steel has moved overseas and the new Great Depression has pulled the rug out from under the American Dream and the landscape is left with rusting and rotting factories and people, normal hard-working folks, are left without the power to make ends meet. Poverty, boredom, idleness - and crime set in, transforming Bud Harris’, the town's sheriff, once quiet easy-to-police community into one with big-city-problems. 

It is against this background that Meyer with a beautiful lyrical voice paints his story that pulls you in from the beginning and doesn’t let you go till the final page. The story centres on unconditional love between friends, between family. Love against odds. Unrequited love. The deep friendship between Isaac and Billy; The complicated relationship of Billy’s mother, Grace, with the town’s sheriff Bud Harris; The loss of Isaac’s mother, the illness of his father, the absence of his sister. All these relationships form the backbone of this story. And while, hopefully, most of us will never be as near to a murder tragedy as Isaac and Billy are, we can all relate to their humanity and its dilemmas. 

This is the best recent novel I have read in 2010. If you like Cormac McCarthy, John Steinbeck, Jack Kerouac, William Faulkner; if you like films like the Deer Hunter (set in the same area) and Deliverance - You need to read this novel.

Let me know what you think of it.

Joran C.A. Monteiro © 2010

Review: 'Light Boxes' by Shane Jones (2009)

(www.penguin.com)

Light Boxes is a mesmerizing parable about a village fighting the continuing onslaught of an everlasting winter instigated by February.  The story centers on the family of Thaddeus, whose young daughter Bianca is taken, early in the book, by February. Thaddeus leads the resistance against February, helped by a cast of original yet recognizable characters.  Bianca, in the mean time, witnesses the innocent ignorance and confused anger of February.                                                                                                                                    

Jones weaves you into a paralel universe that perhaps is not so different from ours. The book is written in a sparse style bordering on the poetic. Jones also plays with the visual presentation of the page, emphasizing emotion with font size and isolation of words.

This book will help you Northern Hemispherians through winter and us Southern Hemispherians should read it so we appreciate summer even more.  The book was originally self-published with a print of only 500 copies but has now been picked up by Penguin, selling thousands. In the top 5 of the best books I've read in 2010.

Let me know what you think of it.

Joran C.A. Monteiro © 2010

REVIEW: 'Growth of the Soil' by Knut Hamsun, 1917

Hamsun won the Nobel Prize for Literature for this book in 1920 and one can see why. With an astounding sparseness of language Hamsun manages to tell the story of the birth of a district in northern Norway, starting with the arrival of the first settler. If you thought you would never be able to relate to early 20th century farmers in remote Norway, think again. You will know these characters, and love them for all their humanity. Hamsun influenced Hemingway, Fitzgerald, Fante, Bukowski and countless others with this book. You should read it too.

Joran C.A. Monteiro