An Invisible Sign of My Own: The Fine Art of Quitting

My review of this novel was published by Off the Shelf! Check out the full piece there.

“Mona Gray is a quitter—and she’s proud of it. Unlike most of us, who are so fixed in our routines that we become afraid to abandon a dead-end job, a failed pursuit, or a waning love interest, Mona relishes in letting go of even the brightest aspects of her life. She quits dessert just to see if she can. She stops running track, even though she’s a star. She quits boyfriends and piano and even egg salad. For her, quitting is a bonsai-like art: just as something new and promising begins to take root and grow, she chops it away and discards it.

It is fitting, then, that for Mona’s twentieth birthday, she buys herself an ax, symbolizing her unusual, obsessive desire to destroy and to break with reality. Even stranger is that she decides to hang it on the wall of the grade school classroom where she teaches. The ax ominously haunts the rest of the novel, threatening to sever the delicate ties Mona is forming with the people around her. It is in this way that An Invisible Sign of My Own uses its core of magical realism and its unlikely course of events to create one of the most surprisingly relatable characters in fiction.”

— https://offtheshelf.com/2015/12/an-invisible-sign-of-my-own-by-aimee-bender/

Adverbs

Adverbs is my all-time favorite novel, and my review of it is featured in Off the Shelf.

“Daniel Handler, the man behind the popular Lemony Snicket books, is best known for this beloved, delightfully melancholy children’s series, but nowhere does he showcase his artful prose and knack for capturing the essence of human relationships better than in his underappreciated fragmentary novel for adults, Adverbs.

...

Because in prioritizing the adverbs and pushing the characters into the background, Handler does something incredibly special: he makes the feelings and experiences universal to his readership, even if you’ve never personally had a fling while videotaping a volcano, felt stirrings for the Snow Queen, or had a rebound relationship with a ghost. If you’ve ever felt you’ve been in love naturally, truly, often, or even collectively, then ADVERBS knows what you’ve been through and shares with you in experiencing—in Handler’s words—the beauty of ‘the way things are done.’”

— http://offtheshelf.com/2015/10/adverbs-by-daniel-handler/

Crooked House, The ABC Murders, and At Bertram's Hotel: A Triptych of Agatha Christie

Isn’t there just something so quaint about Agatha Christie? You may have read Murder on the Orient Express or And Then There Were None when you were young—almost everyone who partakes of the occasional whodunit has come across one or both of these—but according to her website, Agatha Christie wrote approximately sixty-six thousand other novels. Now, I may be off by a couple zeroes there, but really, there’s a reason this woman is known as the Queen of Crime.

So, I’ll admit it now, if you haven’t already guessed: I’ve been on a Christie kick. When I was in London for work last month, I had the pleasure of seeing The Mousetrap, the world’s longest-running play, and it was everything I hoped it would be. There was nothing spectacular or flashy about it. The set was stationary; no one revolted on any spinning barricades or opened any underground lairs filled with moats and smoke machines. It was just a cast of characters, a group of misfits with something surprising in common, all staying at a newly-opened bed and breakfast during a horrible snowstorm with a killer on the loose. It was perfect. It reminded me of the movie Clue (which I definitely haven’t seen hundreds of times).

Even after seeing the play and reading three Agatha Christie novels in under two weeks (Crooked House, The ABC Murders, and At Bertram’s Hotel), I still feel utterly tickled by the classic whodunit. I love the charming, iconic detective character (perhaps with his perfect little moustaches or her quiet, observational style). I love the setup and the denouement. But what I love most about all three of these books (and the play, and Christie’s two best-known works) is that they rely so heavily upon a collection of suspicious characters, any of whom have the means, motive, and opportunity to be the villain.

Crooked House in particular of these three recent reads allowed me to best relive that perfect mystery experience. The main character is not either of Christie’s famous detectives (Poirot or Miss Marple), so in a way, this draws the reader further into the mystery of the situation. The narrator is a man who wishes to marry a lovely young woman, but this woman’s elderly grandfather has just been poisoned, apparently by his much younger wife. The entire family wants to believe it’s the widow who has committed the crime, but the narrator gets the feeling that this might just be wishful thinking. So as both an insider and an outsider to the family, the narrator does a little investigation of his own and discovers that, as his fiancée puts it, every single member of the crooked little family is, in their own way, “ruthless.”

The ABC Murders, on the other hand, is the kind of book that makes you want to leap up from your armchair with a magnifying glass and yell, “There’s murder afoot!” In The ABC Murders, famed detective Hercule Poirot receives a letter announcing a sinister event that will happen in Andover on a particular date and challenging Poirot to stop it. As a clever reader might anticipate from the title, this is the start of a series of alphabetical murders: Ascher in Andover, Barnard in Bexhill, etc., each one occurring before the detective can do anything to prevent the crime from happening. The route to the solution of the alphabet murders is, ironically, in numbers: the loved ones of the deceased band together to help Poirot track down the serial killer—a man who may just have ties to one of them.

At Bertram’s Hotel holds the particular beauty of being more than it seems. In fact, I found the first half of the novel almost dull in its straightforwardness. So much time was spent introducing characters without any hint of a crime: a wealthy actress, her boarding school daughter, a clergyman, a racecar driver—all of them together (or around) Bertram’s Hotel, a perfectly adorable old-fashioned place to stay and enjoy the luxuries and nostalgia of days past. What these seemingly disconnected set of characters don’t realize is that while they think they’re alone, the unimposing Miss Marple is witness to more than they’d like her to know.

In each of these three novels, the characters are what make the mystery special. Christie is careful about releasing just the right amount of information to lay suspicion on each person without tipping the scales too much in favor of an obvious red herring. And although the character may conform too much to certain archetypes or fill stereotypical roles within the story, their backstories are well-planned and their motives duly considered. More importantly still is the way Christie weaves the connections together—there is often more than one person involved in the crime, and many others who, in sharing what they know, can discover the truth.  It is truly the character web that manages to trap the criminal.

So, are Christie’s works as monumental and prominent as other great classical literature? No, probably not. But are they a little twisted, fun, clever, and often surprisingly original? Absolutely. Agatha Christie’s books are never a strain to read, but they do force the rusty problem-solving gears in your brain to oil up and get turning. And perhaps they might make you just a little more perceptive and skeptical of the people around you.

Because if there’s anything I learned from Dame Agatha, it’s that whenever you get a group of idiosyncratic people together (be they members of a fractured family, guests at a hotel, or passengers on a train), there will be at least one murder, and the killer will be among them.

Good luck at your next big family gathering!

TL;DR: In each of these novels, a large cast of characters is drawn into a mystery when someone close to them is murdered. Wow, I summed up three books with one tagline. Is that a bad thing? 

"I read this"[1]: My newfound probable lifelong addiction to Infinite Jest

It's funny, the way obsession can trickle in. When I first decided to read Infinite Jest, I'll admit that it was mainly because of two things: 1. It was available on Kindle, so I wouldn't have to lug around a brick, and 2. It was on sale for only $3.99. 

And I suppose the third—and arguably best—reason was that I figured I should read it sometime. I don't know why I felt compelled here; I never make reading an obligation, and I will boldly declare my resistance to reading that I've deemed unnecessary.[2] For me, there is no "supposed to." And truth be told, I like short books. There are usually very few 1,000-page novels on my to-read list. But this one stuck out.

Maybe it was because years ago, I recalled seeing the very first IJ challenge on infinitesummer.org and always regretted not doing it. Maybe it was because the concept of an IJ-type book infiltrating a person's life inspired a short story I wrote for my master's thesis,[3] and I'd always wondered what it was really about. Or maybe it was because my boyfriend told me he read about 400 pages of it years ago and had to give up, and I'm just that competitive.[4]

Whatever, I'm just glad I read it. My only regret in reading it is that I can no longer read it for the first time again.

Infinite Jest is a sort of complicated-to-define story. Over the course of my ~2 months of reading-filled commutes,[5] I've had a number of friends ask me, "What's it even about?"

Well, tennis. But also entertainment. Politics. Politics as entertainment. Entertainment as politics. Wheelchair assassins. More tennis. Tennis as politics. The politics of tennis. Drugs. Addiction. Entertainment as addiction. Cats in garbage bags. Quebecois separatism. Mothers.

To make it a little clearer, here are the (incredibly simplified) three main threads to Infinite Jest:

1. The Enfield Tennis Academy, a competitive tennis boarding school founded by the late James O. Incandenza, hobbyist filmmaker, former tennis player, and father of Orin (tennis player-turned-football star), Mario (apprentice filmmaker with numerous physical and mental disabilities), and Hal (?).[6] After JOI's death, the school was taken over by his wife, Avril, and her half-brother,[7] Charles Tavis. There are some odd things happening around the school, particularly in regards to JOI's youngest son, Hal, who is in his final year at ETA.

2. The Ennet House Drug and Alcohol Recovery House,[8] where a number of addicts (whom we get to know very well over the course of the novel) go to confront their problems, following the motions of the spiritual principals of recovery. Key characters include Don Gately, former burglar-turned-counselor-in-residence, and Joelle Van Dyne, a mysterious veiled woman (and perhaps the prettiest girl of all time).

3. The Organization of North American Nations[9], which is the setting for the entire novel, and which is in a state of crisis due to the Quebecois separatist movement and the circulation of a lethal entertainment cartridge that reduces its viewers to transfixed, drooling, lifelong[10] addicts. 

It's not necessarily obvious how these three threads will come together, and David Foster Wallace doesn't just hand the story to you, either. In fact, the largest complaint I've read about IJ is that the ending, well... kind of isn't one. As my eyes soaked up the final words of this seemingly infinite story, I tried to swipe to the next page and realized that was it. I was at the endnotes.[11] My hands were practically shaking. Only pages before, we'd been introduced to new characters, more backstory, more questions—and then it suddenly, seemingly ends.

But that's the beauty of Infinite Jest. It doesn't end. The story continues beyond the written work, and the book gives you enough to know what happens next, as long as you've been paying attention along the way. Although the ending of the novel is not the resolution of the story, it's like the close of an elaborate symphony: the movements should continue resonating in your head long after the final notes.

Oh, and they do. Every day since I finished the book, some other little connection springs to mind—something I may have glossed over, but that suddenly clicks and illuminates a whole other section of the novel. I've been reading articles. Analysis. I've been printing out fan artwork[12] and hanging it up in my cubicle at work.

And what's even more interesting is how gradually the book consumed me. I remember the dark days of confusion in the earlier chapters, hoping it would get better, followed by little moments of understanding that grew into connections and further curiosities. I remember when parts of the book became borderline laugh-out-loud hilarious to me,[13] and when I finally felt like I was falling in love. I have a document of notes and predictions; my Kindle edition has pages-long highlights. This book is a masterpiece. And upon finishing it, it was all I could do to keep myself from going back to page 1 and starting over again.

TL;DR:  Ha!

NOTES AND ERRATA

[1] A reference to a scene early in the novel where a young Hal Incandenza presents a handful of mold to his germaphobic mother, Avril, and declares, "I ate this."
[2] See relevant guest blog entry: "Why I'll Never Bother Reading Ulysses"
[3] Entitled "Saved," this short story plays out the "one book on a desert island" hypothetical.
[4] Love you, sweetie.
[5] I read at an atypically slow ~20 pages per hour.
[6] What's going on with Hal is a key question in this book. Far be it from me to reveal anything.
[7] Or adopted brother—it's not exactly clear to any parties involved.
[8] Sic
[9] O.N.A.N.
[10] Because they can't bear to do anything (not even eat or sleep) except watch the video on repeat, "lifelong" is relative here.
[11] IJ is infamous for its ~100 pages of endnotes, all of which are meant to be read as you're reading the main text. Do not ignore the endnotes. They are often funnier, more interesting, and more revealing than the novel itself. There are footnotes to the endnotes.
[12] Often the work of Chris Ayers. Site is not totally spoiler-free.
[13] My favorite of which features a phone call between two of the Incandenza boys where Hal repeatedly interrupts their discussion to explain his success streak of landing his toenail clippings in the garbage can as he trims them.

We Are Pirates

I have been waiting for this weird and wonderful work to be published for years. Anyone who knows me knows that my favorite book of all time is Daniel Handler’s Adverbs, and while We Are Pirates is entirely different, it’s packed full of all the usual things that make Handler’s work brilliant. Powerful, funny prose that catches you by surprise with its unique ability to frame reality, a collection of believable characters that still somehow verges on the absurd—and, most importantly, an unusual, whimsical premise that gives the reader a view of our world via a lens of the extraordinary.

Troubled by parental oppression and plagued by the urge to plunder, fourteen-year-old Gwen Needle gathers an Alzheimer’s patient, a lovestruck boy, a Haitian nursing home attendant, and her new best friend into a group of pirates—real pirates, attacking and pillaging from their stolen ship in the San Francisco Bay. Meanwhile, her father is struggling to pitch an idea for a radio show, resist the temptation of his young assistant, and, hopefully, get his daughter home safely.

As a longtime fan of Handler’s, I appreciate the subtleties in this novel more than anything else. Handler has this delicious habit of creating inside jokes with the reader by reusing phrases, imagery, and snippets of dialogue, all while hearkening back to traditional pirate lore and dropping in other relevant allusions.

For example, the two teenage girls (those “wenches”) often encourage one another with a hearty “verily” during their exploits. Whenever possible, everyday situations are likened to life on the high seas in unexpected, sometimes ridiculous, but always enlightening ways. The storybook-fueled inspiration for their pirating journey could have been lifted right out of the plot of Don Quixote, complete with senile old man who has a somehow richer perspective on life. And the further you sail into the book, the stronger the parallels become, and the more familiar you feel with the characters, the author, and the story.

Daniel Handler recently stated in an interview: "[F]or the life of me I am mystified by the appeal of novels showing us the Way We Live Now. ... [M]ost of all I am interested in the Way We Don’t Live Now, a book with the essential strangeness of great literature. The strange illuminates the ordinary. But somebody tell me, please, what the ordinary is supposed to illuminate."

This is the key thing about We Are Pirates that I think some initial negative Goodreads reviews are missing. By being strange, We Are Pirates illuminates the ordinary. We don’t need a story about pirates to understand the relationship between an angst-ridden teenage girl and her frustrating parents, but doesn’t that make it so much more fun? Doesn’t it cast the usual family dynamic in a new, exciting light? Doesn’t it teach us, after everything, that perhaps we all have a little bit of the pirate spirit in us? I say “verily.”

“We steal the happiness of others in order to be happy ourselves, and when it is stolen from us we voyage desperately to steal it back. We are pirates.”

— Daniel Handler

There is currently no other book like this one on the market. It has all the intrigue of an old-fashioned pirating tale without being antiquated, the reality of the family life without being supremely dull, the childlike pursuit of adventure without being a kids’ book, and the darkness of a historical drama without being some throwaway thriller. For skeptical Snicket fans—you’re right, it’s not A Series of Unfortunate Events—but I assert that it is so, so much better. 

TL;DR:  I refuse to write one for this book. I love Daniel Handler. Read my review. Read his book.

Why I’ll Never Bother Reading Ulysses

I met a fellow a year ago, a friend’s roommate, who claimed to be a published writer.

          “Oh, yeah?” I said, feigning interest. I, too, wanted to be a published fiction writer, but I’d always had a hard time relating to other writers. I didn’t care what their books were about. I didn’t care where they got their ideas (usually thinly-veiled descriptions of their own lives). I was just jealous that they were published. So, in an attempt to make conversation, I asked the most basic, non-offensive question I could think of: “What would you say your favorite book is?”

          The writer replied, speaking in his elegant, flowing Irish brogue, “Ah, well, that would have to be Ulysses, by James Joyce.”

          I laughed in his face.

          “What!” I exclaimed. “Come on, no one’s favorite book is Ulysses.”

          In retrospect, maybe I was a little rude. For a while, I stood by what I said. At best, it’s pretentious to have Ulysses as a favorite book. At worst, it’s a downright lie. No one reads that book for any reason but to say they’ve read it. But after a while, I considered that maybe I was wrong. Maybe the rest of the literary world really did appreciate things I didn’t.

          Maybe I was the only one faking it.

          Since I completed my Master’s degree in English, I have been making the same terrible joke to everyone. “Well, it’s confirmed. I’ve officially mastered English.” I get a halfhearted chuckle out of most people, but my playful sarcasm over my newly-acquired Master’s is more revealing than it seems.

          I’m embarrassed because even with a graduate degree in my field, I’ve started to feel as if I haven’t mastered it at all. Who is the main character in For Whom the Bell Tolls? Um, some guy who was in a war, I guess. Can I describe the overall idea behind Nicholas Nickleby? If it’s anything like Dickens’s other novels, it’s social satire told through the life of a main character and his web of interrelationships with dozens of other characters. What happens in Pride and Prejudice? I have no idea, but probably somebody gets married.

          I’ve always figured it’s that sort of guesswork that enables an English major to succeed, and that like me, no one actually reads all of that nonsense. We read what we like (for me: Vladimir Nabokov, Daniel Handler, George Orwell, and David Sedaris, to name a few) and just go on Wikipedia or Sparknotes to confirm that we know the vague concepts behind the works we don’t feel like plodding through.

          Once I got to graduate school, I realized I might be the only one doing that. I met yet another young man who told me his favorite book was Ulysses. This time I replied, “Really?” I was in shock. I’d never touched that book. Never thought about opening it. I hadn’t even considered reading a summary. And here was the second person in the span of a few weeks who’d declared it his favorite.

          “Yeah,” he told me. “I spent months just sitting down and dissecting every word, looking up every reference. It totally changed my life.”

          Was this how every literature nerd did it? Were they all really dedicated enough to embrace each work placed before them, dutifully taking notes in the margins, tracking each allusion, translating every unknown phrase? Did they really read everything their professors assigned, rather than skimming hundreds of pages the night before class the way I did, hoping they wouldn’t get called on to answer any questions about specific details?

          I suddenly felt inadequate even outside of my literary circle. More than ever before, I grew nervous when my friends would expect me to know the plot of a story or the definition of a word.

          “You should know that,” they’d tell me. “You’re an English major.” Half the time I wouldn’t even give an answer for fear of being wrong.

          Was it really my job, as a lover of English, to memorize the whole dictionary and become my friends’ personal card catalog? Would I be scoffed at every time I didn’t know the answer to a book-related question on Jeopardy! or a literary reference in a movie?

          No. As a dear friend of mine declared in her recent Soapbox post, “That Which We Call a Rose,” (a Romeo and Juliet allusion, I assume): “You can’t know it all.” That’s true no matter which nerd culture you embrace. No matter how much you love the topic (and, although my academic peers may weary me, I do love literature), you don’t want to saturate your life with it in the sole interest of becoming a walking encyclopedia. If you did, there would be no time for other valuable activities, such as mocking people for liking Ulysses.

          So, don’t forgive me—professors, students—for all my sins. It’s true; I have not been able to complete many of my readings. I have spent hundreds of dollars on books, some of which I may never get around to finishing, all so I can go into class and nod along as if I, too, know what sound startled Clarissa in chapter whatever of Mrs. Dalloway. I’m no longer ashamed of that. There’s only so much time in a week, and I don’t study literature to fake it. I study it to love it. If I believe I’ll love a work, I will go back and reread anything I missed when I didn’t have time for it during the semester. I will embrace each story for what it is, not for what it means about me as a reader, a writer, or a student.

          People will likely still turn to me to answer questions about words they don’t know or books they haven’t read, and I will continue to use my extensive experience in interpreting context clues to give them the best answers I can. They will be satisfied, and I will remain their resident English nerd. If only they knew how little I knew.

Ana is a self-consciously self-proclaimed English nerd who hasn’t read everything she’s supposed to. She hasn’t even read all the previous posts on this blog, and there really aren’t that many. She double-checked all allusions in this story with Wikipedia.