Modern Romance - Aziz Ansari (with Eric Klinenberg) (2015)

Do I really need to write a review of this book?
Haven't you already seen the reviews, like five months ago?
This is actually one of the few books that most lay people (i.e. non-readers) of a certain age know.
They know it because they know Aziz Ansari, and it's about dating, and he's right: it's both a wonderful and horrible time to be single.
This book is candy to Penguin Press.

Do I need to parrot the ideas of this book or can I just write this as a special comment on Tinder?

I always try to "personalize" these reviews so they're more valuable than the "objective" stuff you'll find in any number of major newspaper markets across the country.  But this is a real opportunity for extreme personalization, and I don't want to go there.  I will start off with a pertinent quote, so you know what to expect:

"One thing that I definitely want you to know up front is that this book is primarily about heterosexual relationships.  Early in the process Eric and I realized that if we tried to write about how all the different aspects of romance we address applied to LGBT relationships, we simply wouldn't be able to do the topic justice without writing an entirely separate book.  We do cover some issues relating to love and romance among gays and lesbians, but not at all exhaustively." (8-9)

Because of this, while I initially flirted with the idea of putting this on the "best books" list, it fails.  I'm not that strident of an activist so I really don't care to start a fuss over the idea that LGBT relationships are different from straight ones, but I will comment briefly that a law school classmate of mine wrote a law review article about domestic violence in LGBT relationships and found that there wasn't much of a difference (I mean, obviously, in straight ones it's usually the dude doing the hitting, I'm guessing).  I do think gay dudes are way less picky when it comes to sex partners, in general.  That's about all I can say, though.  I'm not too angry, because I do think there should be a book about dating for bi people.  I just think it's a little troubling, economically, particularly when that big SCOTUS decision came down just as this book was released (June 16, 2015).  Straight people wouldn't be interested in reading about non-straight people, I guess.

What would a book about dating for bi people be like?  It would be the most fucked up thing in the world.  Do you disclose, or do you pretend?  Do you delete all your old Facebook references to anything that might give a potential date the idea that you had never strayed from the straight and narrow?  I really don't think there is any problem whatsoever for a bi dude to tell a same-sex partner that he likes girls--I think they're more excited by the idea of a straight dude than a gay one (at least for a casual thing)--but does that work on the opposite level for girls?  I mean, of course, girls don't want to go out with bi dudes, but are lesbians open to going out with bi girls?  Frankly, if Mr. Ansari would like to entrust such a project to a fellow '05 NYU Alum, I will rip up my law license and skip down the street.

I've been a little bit harsh in starting off this review, so let's move onto the positives: this is probably the funniest book I have reviewed on Flying Houses.  I laughed out loud while reading it more than a few times, and on the CTA that was sometimes embarrassing.  I think this was the line, yesterday:

"I'd run the Hardee's and probably be pretty good at it.  Maybe I'd catch wind of a guy who was running a huge 'biscuit extortion' scam to smuggle biscuits across the border to Georgia [from South Carolina].  The scam would work like this: The guy and his partner would steal biscuits from our store and then sell the stolen biscuits at a lower cost on the biscuit black market.  After getting suspicious of his frequent trips to Georgia, I would hide in the bed of a Ford F-150, under a bunch of biscuits, and when they reached their destination, I'd dramatically pop up and go, 'GIMME BACK MY BISCUITS!'
The family would be proud." (237)

It's not even that funny, really, but the image cracked me up.

Upon further review, it was actually this passage that made me laugh to embarrassment:

"My Dearest Charles,
I hope this letter finds you in the halest and heartiest of conditions.  I'm sure it will, as your constitution, as I recall, was always most impressive for its resilience and fortitude.
What do you make of this so-called 'Revolution'?  I fear that, win or lose, we shall be feeling its reverberations for decades to come.
In other news, in addition to your sister, I am fucking Tina, this woman I met at the bar last week.  I also caught syphilis from a prostitute I met in Boston.
Fondly, your brother-in-law,
Henry" (225)

Is Mr. Ansari a good writer?  I think so.  It's unclear to me how much of this book is written by him and how much is written by Klinenberg, but it feels like it's mostly Ansari, even when there's not a joke being thrown in every few sentences.

The constant jokes aren't a distraction.  Instead, they change the book into something different entirely.  Now I know that comedians get book deals, and sometimes their books are funny, but this is more impressive because it's about something else, something that most younger people might want to know.

The problem is that we all already know.  There is some interesting research that the book brings out, but all of the perceptions, all of the subjective stuff, we know.  We know about not texting back immediately for fear of seeming too desperate.  We know about selecting profile pictures.  There is a lot of stuff "we" know, but we don't really know that other people feel it too, and I guess that's why this book is nice.  Ansari is never mean-spirited with the jokes here, and that's impressive in this arena.  It also has the potential to get extremely raunchy, but the dirty stuff is kept relatively safe.

The central thesis, if you will, is that "good enough" partners are not good enough for people anymore.  We now require a soul mate.  Along the way in that search, we might discard some really amazing people, and Ansari advocates on behalf of "quality" rather than "quantity."  It's better to get to know a person really well and find out everything that's great about them, rather than to meet a lot of people and only get to know them superficially before deciding there's someone better for you.

This is kind of the romantic issue of our time, and Ansari is clever to seize upon the moment and call it out for what it is.  Thousands of people have written about these issues over the past half-decade, but Ansari is the first to turn it into a book with mass appeal.  And he is the right person to do it because the humor complements the material in a strange way.  In a sense, it almost detracts from the material, but this turns it into a strength.

Perhaps this sounds strange.  Really what I mean is, you can't take a book with this subject matter all that seriously.  You're not supposed to.  Ansari isn't saying WE ARE ALL LIKE THIS; he's just sharing stories that he heard in focus groups and surveys and sociological studies.  He also writes about his own romantic travails to powerful effect, though I contend that he leaves an important element of dating/mating out: money.

Maybe I'm cynical, okay, but we can't all go out every weekend night and spend 5 hours in a bar or club and spend $200 on drinks.  And when we think about who would be a good partner, tell me nobody cares about their job.  Of course, many more women pursue a professional career than in the past, and marriage has become a kind of status symbol--more of a "power couple" thing than the traditional "sole breadwinner" thing.  I would have liked to hear more about stay-at-home dads.

Ansari effectively describes the shift in marriage habits, from our grandparents' and parents' generations to ours.  Perhaps this is why I often said I wished I was 10 years older, back in '01 and '02.  But maybe it's more like 20 or 30 years older.  The difference is, the older generations did not have the experience that we do of "emerging adulthood," the period between, say, 23-30, when we pretty much live on our own and seek a mate that is most complementary to our vision of a worthwhile existence.  Ansari thinks this period is a great thing, more or less, but personally I'm not sure.  Now, I have no problem with their being tons of single people getting older and not having kids--so long as we're not lonely.  But I do have a problem when I am 32 and I look around and see that most people my age are married, or engaged, or have kids, or have a good job with a retirement plan, and I have nothing.  I guess it would hurt a lot more 20 years ago to be in the same situation at my age, but my belief is, it wouldn't be this way 20 years ago.  But I should shut up before I say something dumb and insensitive.

There are some really intriguing parts, particularly about Japan and the way their government is responding to the low-birth-rate crisis by subsidizing singles' parties.  And of course there are some priceless stories:

"Back in June of 2012 when I was 43, my boyfriend broke up w/ me via a text message after being together for 8 years!  I practically raised his daughter, and had been totally committed to him [and] everything that came w/ him.  I was really offended and hurt as I felt that I at least deserved to be broken up with in person or at least on the phone! 
Apparently the wound didn't run too deep, though, because look what happened next:
After 10 months of no contact, his uncle passed away [and] I called him [and] left a message w/ my condolences.  We finally talked after that [and] eventually got back together.  I still love him completely [and] have forgive him for how things went down.  And you best believe I gave him hell for that text! :-)
No offense, but at this point let's take a moment to be thankful we are neither of the people in that relationship." (194)

I could go on, and on and on about this book and excerpt every single great joke, but I'm gonna wrap things up here.  I just can't resist putting in my favorite part, which is where Ansari advocates for monster truck rallies as ideal venues for first dates:

"One of the social scientists I consulted for this book is the Stanford sociologist Robb Willer.  Willer said that he had several friends who had taken dates to a monster truck rally.  If you aren't familiar with monster truck rallies, basically these giant-ass trucks, with names like Skull Crusher and The ReJEWvinator,* ride up huge dirt hills and do crazy jumps.  Sometimes they fly over a bunch of smaller cars or even school buses.  Even more nuts, sometimes those trucks assemble into a giant robot truck that literally eats cars.  Not joking.  It's called Truckzilla and it's worth looking into.  Frankly, it sounds cool as shit, and I'm looking at tickets for the next one I can attend. (140)
"*Okay, I made up ReJEWvinator, but it would be cool if there were a Jewish monster truck scene." (141)

The book also ends on a really sweet story about a couple meeting and how they left notes to each other on the doors of their apartment complex.

This isn't necessarily "required reading," but I wouldn't be surprised to hear about this book being passed around between groups of friends in "emerging adulthood."  That is the way the most culturally relevant books attain their cache.  This is increasingly rare, and I applaud Ansari for rejuvenating the medium.

The Pale King - David Foster Wallace (2011)

Wow.  At first I was guessing this was published in 2014, before I looked into the copyright page.  I thought this was going to be one of the more "up to date" reviews, but I guess I'm four years late.  Law school can do that to you.  Then again, would I have ever even read this book if it weren't for my friend that sent it and suggested we form a "book club" and read it together?

I mean, I own Infinite Jest, but only got through about 400 pages on my first attempt, and maybe 150 on my second.  I will finish that book the next time I try.  I considered picking it up this morning, needing a new book start on, before What I Talk about When I Talk about Running comes in from the CPL.  But I wanted a lighter messenger bag for a change.  This is the 3rd book out of the last 4 topping out over 500 pages.  I picked up Disgrace instead.

Imponderables aside, the thoughtfulness of the gift both impressed and imposed an urgency upon me.   The Pale King will not make the Best Books list of this blog, but it is up near that territory.  I'm not sure it would be there, for me, in its finished form either, just because of the lukewarm feeling I get about Infinite Jest.  It's something I feel I should respect and admire, but just can't really bring myself to enjoy reading.  This is getting to be a loaded topic, because it brings up criticisms of DFW like those of BEE, who said he was a "fraud" or "full of shit" or something, because he read a biography of DFW that discussed how he did not have much love for BEE, but still recognized him as an influence on his own writing.

This would probably be a much better book if DFW were able to complete it, mainly to see what he might do next.  As much as this seems unfinished, at almost 550 pages it seems pretty representative of what the overall quality might have been.  Parts of it seem lop-sided, but on the whole it seems about 80-85% finished to me.  I suppose it all depends on how long DFW intended it to be.

For sure, it is an audacious concept for a book, and a perfect one for him: a paean to boredom.  Make the boredom of the everyday lives of IRS examiners in Peoria, IL in the late 70's and early 80's into fine literature.  I was about to write 1985, but I don't believe this story necessarily takes place in 1985.  It's so impressionistic that the "plot" seems secondary to the background sketches of the other characters.

It's not even clear what the "plot" really consists of, but it may consist of Claude Sylvanshine and David Foster Wallace's orientation to their IRS posts in Peoria.  It's hot and they ride in a bus that is a repossessed and re-purposed ice cream truck.  One person sweats an egregious amount.  There is some idle chatter with two other employees.  They go, and DFW gets mixed up with another David F. Wallace (who is older and much more valuable in terms of skill set) and gets introduced by the "Iranian crisis," who gives him a blow job in a janitor's closet.  He also glimpses the face of Glendenning, who is basically in the highest post there, who looks at him sympathetically or some related way because DFW has a horrible skin condition that causes most people to look away.  And that's pretty much it, though there may be other characters on that bus ride near the beginning of the novel.

DFW is a character in this novel.  Ostensibly, it is a memoir:

"Plus there's the autobiographical fact that, like so many other nerdy, disaffected young people of that time, I dreamed of becoming an 'artist,' i.e., somebody whose adult job was original and creative instead of tedious and dronelike.  My specific dream was of becoming an immortally great fiction writer a la Gaddis or Anderson, Balzac or Perec, &;c.; and many of the notebook entries on which parts of this memoir are based were themselves literarily jazzed up and fractured; it's just the way I saw myself at the time.  In some ways, you could say that my literary ambitions were the chief reason I was on hiatus from college and working at the Midwest REC at all, though most of that whole backstory is tangential and will be addressed only here in the Foreword, and very briefly, to wit:" (73-74)

Here, Wallace describes how he paid off his student loans by writing papers for his classmates, and how his school became aware of it.  This is the first part of the novel that feels truly "great."  It is classic DFW, by which I mean it includes footnotes and his trademark erudition.  So yes, certain sections of The Pale King, I would say, are as good as anything DFW has ever done.

This is a great chapter because Wallace could pretty easily convince a person (that didn't know what year he was really born and couldn't do math) that the story is, in fact, true.  One thing I like about his writing is that it captures the essence of reality.  A reader can identify with it on a different level than anything before.  The details--the minute details and almost paranoid insecurities that we all must worry about from time to time--are so readily evoked that DFW appears God-like.  This one of those books that takes you out of your head a bit, and oddly shapes your life around it.

One part, for me, was extremely touching.  One quick background detail, for exposition: from April 2008 through August 2008, I lived in a small bungalow-like studio in Silver Lake, on a hill just off of Sunset Boulevard.  Across Sunset Blvd. was a foot sign.  My friend (the same one who sent me this book) remarked upon it and I agreed it was strange, funny, cute and iconic in its own way.  It was certainly a landmark.  After I left L.A., he sent me an article once about how this sign had actually influenced several fiction writers, such as Jonathan Lethem and DFW.  I immediately thought, "I am chosen.  I was meant to live there, to know that."

Then came page 163, which will from hereon in be christened the "LSAT test," not unlike the "420 test," except that instead of requiring mention because of some relatively direct reference to pot (and while there is a fair amount of "drug material" in this book, it does not pass that test--though page 420 does detail one of the more sensorily-powerful scenes in the novel), it will need to evoke feelings of my life that might be different if I hadn't taken the LSAT and scored a 163:

"I remember rooming in a high-rise UIC dorm with a very mod, with-it sophomore from Naperville who also wore sideburns and a leather thong and played the guitar.  He saw himself as a nonconformist, and also very unfocused and nihilistic, and deeply into the school's wastoid drug scene, and drove what I have to admit was a very cool-looking 1972 Firebird that it eventually turned out his parents paid the insurance on.  I cannot remember his name, try as I might.  UIC stood for the University of Illinois, Chicago campus, a gigantic urban university.  The dorm we roomed in was right on Roosevelt, and our main windows faced a large downtown podiatric clinic--I can't remember its name, either--which had a huge raised electrified neon sign that rotated on its pole every weekday from 8:00 to 8:00 with the name and mnemonic phone number ending in 3668 on one side and on the other a huge colored outline of a human foot--our best guess was a female foot, from the proportions--and I remember that this roommate and I formulated a kind of ritual in which we'd make sure to try to be at the right spot at our windows at 8:00 each night to watch the foot sign go dark and stop rotating when the clinic closed.  It always went dark at the same time the clinic's windows did and we theorized that everything was on one main breaker.  The sign's rotation didn't stop all at once.  It was more like slowly wound down, with almost a wheel-of-fortune quality about it where it would finally stop.  The ritual was that if the sign stopped with the foot facing away, we would go to the UIC library and study, but if it stopped with the foot or any significant part of it facing our windows, we would take it as a 'sign' (with the incredibly obvious double entendre) and immediately blow off any homework or supposed responsibility we had and go instead to the Hat, which at the time was the currently hip UIC pub and place to hear bands, and would drink beers and play quarters and tell all the other kids whose parents were paying their tuition about the ritual of the rotating foot in a way that we all appeared nihilistically wastoid and hip.  I'm seriously embarrassed to remember things like this...." (163)

This turns out to be a videotaped interview with "Irrelevant" Chris Fogle, and it is one of the standout portions of the text.  His father is employed by the City of Chicago as a "cost Systems supervisor," and dies in a horrific CTA accident.  The description of the ensuing litigation with CTA is very accurately rendered.  He grows up in Libertyville, IL and references a number of other towns on the north shore, including Winnetka (a clothing store--Jack Fagman--which his family had patronized since 1964, and which may or may not have existed).  It is basically about the moment that he discovered his calling in life--to serve the IRS.  It details a chance encounter with an Accounting professor at DePaul, and how it took him off the path of serial college enrollments, drugs, and the "wastoid" lifestyle.  In short, this is classic DFW.

Another notable section near the end focuses on a conversation between Shane Drinion and Meredith Rand, two other IRS employees, at a bar's happy hour on a Friday.  Drinion is cyborg-like in his communications, but Rand is relentlessly confessional.  The subject matter of this scene is also touching and personal to me, as I wrote my second novel in between 2007 and 2008, finishing most of its rough draft shortly before DFW committed suicide.  It is heartening to think that we might have been compelled to write about the same topic for similar reasons:

"'I didn't know why I did it.  I'm still not sure, except he taught me that trying to analyze it or understand all the whys was bullshit--the only important thing was knocking it off, because if I didn't it would land me right back in the psych ward, that the idea I could hide it with bandages or sleeves and keep it a totally private thing that didn't affect anybody else was arrogant bullshit.  And he's right.  No matter where you do it or how carefully you do it, there's always a time when somebody sees something and says something, or when somebody is funking around in the hall and pretending to beg you to cut algebra and go to the park and get stoned and climb on the statue of Lincoln and grabs your arm too hard and some of the cuts open up and you bleed through your long sleeves, even if you've got two shirts on, and somebody sends for the nurse even if you tell them to fuck off and it was an accident and you'll just go home and get it seen to at home.  There always comes a day when somebody sees something in your face that tells them you're lying and then the next thing you know there you are, in a lit room with your arms and legs uncovered, trying to explain yourself to somebody with zero sense of humor, actually a little bit like talking to you right now.' With a quick tight smile." (468-469)

While these chapters--DFW's delayed "foreword," the story of "Irrelevant" Chris Fogle's revelation, and the conversation between Meredith Rand and Shane Drinion--are my personal favorites from this book, I hasten to add the caveat that they also go on too long.  Another similarly great chapter is about a young man (who later rides next to DFW on the way to the Midwest REC) who sweats profusely during periods of anxiety.  It is tremendously entertaining and profound in its sensitivity to human nature, but the situations are truly mined to the depths for details.  This may or may not have been a casualty of the incompleteness of this novel.

This sort of seems to be characteristic of his work in general, though, with another one of his chapters ending in the middle of a sentence.  I am not sure how you could provide appropriate closure for Infinite Jest, though I believe Joyce achieved it with Ulysses, which one really must mention in the same breath.  Because if you subscribe to the belief that Ulysses is the greatest English language novel, then I think you will also enjoy DFW to the max.  I don't always, but I think I can appreciate the generic expectations of a reader that sort of begs for a little bit of "guidance" from the author.  DFW definitely provides that "guidance" at certain points, and it is refreshing.  But other parts of this book are about as difficult as Infinite Jest.

My opinions on this book have been adequately dispatched, I believe, but please feel free to comment below, as this truly is the first post on Flying Houses spurred by participation in a book club.

Happy 7th Birthday

Another gloriously unproductive year on Flying Houses, but for some reason, it felt better than the last one.  There were only 21 posts, compared to last year's 25.  We currently sit at 77,318 page views, when we had 59,169 last year, and just over 30,000 the year before.  Thus, our growth has slowed, and that makes me sad.  It makes me feel like I am dying.

Of course, everyone who reads this blog knows two things: (1) blogs about books are not all that popular; (2) I don't market the hell out of it, and apparently update it less than twice per month.

But still, this year feels better than last year, and I have to attribute that to my professional situation.  Those of you who have been with us all the way from beginning (brave souls!) know that it was started at 11100 Santa Monica Blvd.  I forget which floor.  Though that job sucked, and though I have posted highly-sensitive details about my exit and distaste for the temporary help industry, I have very fond memories of those days.  However, it was an unsustainable and ultimately sad life that I lived in L.A.  Certain days (this morning included) I wish I had tried harder there, not given up, not gone home, not bought an LSAT book.  I suppose most of us have to learn the hard way; sometimes things do not have a way of working themselves out.

I digress!  I would not have started this blog if I had not been at Jefferies & Co. at that specific time in history and I thank them for that inspiration.  (I'd also like to thank Rahm Emanuel for causing the recession.)

We did not hit 300 posts this year.  We are 4 short.  I am not going to quit, however.  I may quit one day, but that may be when I know the end is near, or the day the printed word becomes obsolete.  There is still work to be done.

The most notable achievement from the last year was certainly the posting of Think and Grow Poor, which now sits above Daylight Savings Time on this blog's homepage.  I am seriously depressed that I'm not making money off of this writing, but I have avoided posting S/M for a long time now.  I may release that as an e-book.

Speaking of money, this blog has earned $29.21 in seven years.  It must be the most unprofitable venture of all time.

That said, I am reasonably sure that AdSense has systematically raised the minimum payment amount several times to avoid any remuneration to me.  I'm pretty sure it used to be $10, then it was $25, and now it is $100.  So it will take me a long time to get paid.  I read about a class action lawsuit that was going to be filed against them.  I hope to be included, but I'm afraid my claim is not substantially similar.

I realize it was about 15 years ago that people used to tell their friends, "Click on an ad!" but I will just ask once.  About a year ago I was working at CTA, and we had a plaintiff come in for a deposition.  She said she fell down on a bus that slammed on its brakes.  Somehow it got brought out that she ran a blog--a fashion blog--where she took pictures of herself in various plus-size outfits.  She said she made about $300 a month on the advertising.  I was like, holy shit.  This girl could teach me something.

So don't be surprised if I start putting myself out there.

Speaking of putting myself out there, I am afraid to Google myself.  I know what used to show up, at least, and it makes me want to either kill myself or fly into a murderous rage.  Neither would be conducive towards a happy future.  At this time, I am concerned that it has turned me into a joke of a person that no one would ever want to hire.  Now I may be a joke of a person, but I want to be my joke of a person--not anybody else's.  Fuck people who presume to know the details.

Having said that, there is a request for a new NIED piece.  It would appear that all of my columns have been archived at BLS Advocate, However, #25 was chopped in two, and I think it seriously lost its power by being cut down into manageable bite-size portions, one with convenient advice for passing the bar exam.  The original text of #25 is lost, so it must remain in its expurgated form on BLS Advocate.  #26, however, will be coming soon...

Generally, this was a good year in terms of maintaining a readership and eliciting fascinating and helpful comments.  I received an offer for a review copy of a book by a Turkish feminist about the 16th century Ottoman Empire.  I said I would be delighted to receive a copy and review it, though none has arrived.  It is unfortunate that neither the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago Reader, nor any other publication has reached out to me regarding a part-time position for once weekly or monthly book reviews, but perhaps, if forced to work within the confines of an editorial staff, the substance of my criticism would be sapped.  For there is little substance.  It is all reader-response here.  I do not deign to posit a formula for a great book other than being moved by my past tangible experience.

Stay tuned for NIED #26, which could be a doozy, and a double (possibly triple) review of The Pale King.  Be patient for the latter.

Interview - Kyle Thomas Smith

After reading 85A, I reached out to its author, Kyle Thomas Smith, and asked if I could interview him.  Graciously, he accepted and I sent him 20 questions on sometimes absurd topics (i.e. the question about the BRT system on Ashland Ave.).   The interview sheds light on the writing process, certain details about the novel (though I did my best to avoid spoilers), and some recommendations for further reading.  Hope you enjoy it.

JK: When did you first begin writing 85A?  How long did it take you from the writings of the first pages of the first draft, through the final publication of the book?

KTS: I began writing 85A as a short story in early 2008. Next thing I knew it was 80 pages and I wasn't even at the quarter mark for the first draft. I kept writing at white heat, it was a cathartic venture. Within a year, I had a manuscript. Within two years, by 2010, I had a published novel.

JK: How did you go about getting the book published?  Did you send query letters to agents or the publishing house directly?

KTS: I did the standard drill. I shopped around for an agent and met with rejection, which I pretty much expected given Seamus' gutter mouth and illicit affair with a man more than twice his age. Then I got lucky. I had registered in an online forum - I forget which one, it was one of those informational symposiums on how to pitch your breakout novel - and I happened to chat with a publisher who owned a small press in Minneapolis. I told him about 85A, he liked the premise, I sent him the manuscript, he accepted it. 

JK: Who are your top five favorite authors of all time?  

KTS: That's a tough one. I read a lot, and I like different authors for different reasons. Maybe the best way to answer your question would be to say that, when my husband Julius got me a Kindle this past Christmas, I scrambled to download the authors whose works I'd broken the most bag straps lugging around. They included D.H. Lawrence, Virginia Woolf, Patrick Dennis, Flannery O'Connor, Yukio Mishima, Raymond Carver, Allan Sillitoe. One of my cats is named Marquez, if that helps. I don't read too many contemporary authors, though I do like early Paul Auster, and Elisabeth Strout's "Olive Kitteridge" was nothing short of a masterpiece. I'm also huge into theater and my favorite dramatists are Ibsen, Tennessee Williams and Joe Orton, whose life was cut short before he could write his best plays. That's more than five, I know, but it's hard to be decisive in the shadow of so many giants.

JK: Did you write exclusively for a living at the time you wrote 85A or did you need to work a separate job too?  Is this situation still the same (i.e. how did your life change, if at all, after publishing it)?

KTS: For about ten years, I was one of those writers who woke up at 4 o'clock every weekday morning to write before work. Through most of my post-college life, I made my living writing for nonprofits--grants and marketing materials and so forth. It was hard work, long hours, made all the more onerous by my ADD. I was stretched way too thin and, through it all, was trying to salvage my dream of being an author. By the time I began writing 85A, though, I'd moved in with my then-boyfriend, now-husband. He believed in me and I was able to exit cubicle hell and devote myself full-time to writing. I know I'm lucky, I know that, but if you'd seen me and the circles under my eyes back then, you'd agree I'd paid my dues, and I don't take my good fortune for granted today.

JK: Much of 85A seems drawn from real-life experiences in Chicago in 1989.  How much of it is autobiographical? 

KTS: 85A is about as autobiographical for me as "The Glass Menagerie" was for Williams. I grew up on the northwest side and went to school on the south side like Seamus, although unlike him, I'm the youngest of seven kids (he has only one sibling), but when things got unbearable at home, I moved in with my Grampa in Rogers Park, which was 100 percent more integrated and creatively fecund than anywhere to the north and west of Logan Square at the time. Between Rogers Park and West Town, which was just beginning to attract artists en masse then, I had a vision of salvation. Sometimes I wish I could recapture that vision.

JK: Do you know if the Blue Line changed its route?  The only factual error that stood out to me is that it stops at Division and Milwaukee, while it appears in the book that it stops at Division and Ashland. 

KTS: That's actually not a factual error. Growing up, the conductors almost always announced that stop as Division and Ashland, rarely Division-Milwaukee. That might have changed in time, I don't know. Later, I lived at Division/Ashland/Milwaukee as a young adult when it was a far different place than it is today. But bear in mind, I'm pushing 40 now. When I was taking the L to and from school as a teenager, they didn't call them the blue line or red line or brown line. In fact, they'd only recently begun calling the blue line the O'Hare line as they'd only extended the L past River Road (now Rosemont) in 1984 or 1985. The Red Line was the Howard-Englewood Line. The Brown Line was the Ravenswood Line. I can't remember what they called the Green Line but the Orange Line was the Midway Line. It's a different nomenclature now.

JK: Do you have any thoughts on the proposal to establish a rapid transit bus operation on
Ashland Avenue?

KTS: No, I'm sorry, I don't have any thoughts on it. I know nothing about it. I haven't lived in Chicago in ages so I'm not sure what's going on there.

JK: Did you obtain approval from the CTA before publishing this book (full disclosure: I work at the CTA Law Department and really enjoyed the details you included about the Blue Line because I live right at the Logan Square stop)?

KTS: In the process of publishing, I'd consulted attorneys on copyright matters and they indicated that I did not need to obtain special permission to mention public-transportation stops as it was no different than mentioning street names.

JK: You live in Brooklyn, and you've written a novel, so you probably understand the phenomenon of so many books taking place in New York.  Why do you think this is?  I haven't read many great books about Chicago.  Crossing California is the only thing that comes to mind.  Have you read that? 

KTS: I'd never heard of "Crossing California" until now, though I did love Langer's "The Thieves of Manhattan." Thanks for the rec, I'll check it out. 

I don't know why there aren't more great books about life in Chicago. Nelson Algren and Stuart Dybek found plenty to say about it. It's pretty evident why people write about New York, though. It's a whirlwind, a maelstrom, there are all sorts in all places at all times from all over the world. No matter where you're from, if you can find a way to stay there (which is infinitely easier said than done), you can reinvent yourself and you'll rub shoulders with some of the most extreme characters, for better or for worse, you'll ever meet. The problem is, how do you find time to write about New York when you're so busy trying to make rent, which is triple what it is just about anywhere else in the country? 

JK: Did you live in Chicago after college?  If so, what made you want to live in New York?  Do you think Chicago is dying?  Which city do you think has a brighter future?

KTS: I was born and raised in Chicago. I went to UIC and continued living in Chicago for several years after graduation as I worked on my writing. I had just been there too long. I was itching to get out. I'd made a failed attempt at living in Europe, just couldn't set down roots and kept wandering. New York was alive and vital and called out to me like a Siren. There seemed only one viable place to go. I made friends there right off the bat and found my true home. There have been harrowing challenges but they didn't bother me inordinately, they just seemed to be part of the game.

Is Chicago dying? Hell no! Chicago is a never-say-die town. I go all over the world and I've never seen a city that affirms itself anywhere near as much as Chicago does. Friends from home come see me and I'm floored by how each and every one of them won't stop rhapsodizing about all that's going on in Chicago, whether it's the horrid politics or the amazing Taste of Chicago or Millennium Park or Steppenwolf; the way they talk, you'd think there's nothing else going on on this planet if it ain't happenin' in Chicago. New York doesn't do that. It's already New York, so dot dot dot.

Which city has a brighter future? Well, since so much of the world financial industry is based in Manhattan, there will probably always be more investment in New York, so its economic future as a city is most likely brighter--just as long as this new spate of hurricanes we've been experiencing doesn't wipe us off the map.

For artists, New York is becoming prohibitively expensive, though. In Chicago, however, you can still afford to try, fail and try again. In New York, you're one flop away from the next Greyhound back to Dodge--so Chicago gives more latitude for experimentation, the mother of mastery.

In terms of whose mayor is bringing along the next generation better, I'd put my chips on De Blasio. Yes, he's still untested but he's going all in for universal pre-K and efforts to reform Bloomberg-era charter-schools initiatives so they don't stay on track to becoming yet another extension of a failed No Child Left Behind policy. He's putting forth measures to create more affordable housing and to reconcile the city's appalling income disparity. He's clamping down on stop-and-frisk. Rahm Emmanuel, by contrast, has been systematically shuttering the Chicago public school system and, at one point, had suspended red-line service on the south side with little expressed interest on how that would impact the lives of low-income families, many of whom already had to travel far and wide for work every day. Daley might not have been any great crusader for the construction of fair housing in opportunity areas or for reinvestment in blighted neighborhoods but at least he was a south-sider! He never would have let that happen.

New York's homicide, gun violence and violent crime rates are much lower than in Chicago. The reasons for this are many and varied and too much to unpack in a single interview but I do hope to see those tragedies diminish in my city of origin.

JK: Did you actually grow up in the city of Chicago, in the same area of Rogers Park as Seamus?  If so, do you ever wish you grew up in the suburbs, or closer to the center of the city (full disclosure: I grew up on the North Shore and often wish I grew up in the city)?

KTS: Yes, I grew up in the city, a little north of Jefferson Park. To be clear, Seamus did not grow up in Rogers Park. If he had, he'd have no cause to complain about lack of diversity in his neighborhood. In the book, he's living on the far northwest side - in fact, Part One is called Northwest Side.

I've never lived in suburbs. I've always felt an intense aversion to them. The northwest side gave me quite enough angst to chew on growing up. There was no need to cross the city limits for more.

JK: Do you have any opinions about the present state of the Chicago National League Ball Club?

KTS: No. Haven't watched baseball since I was about 12.

JK: What are your top 3 favorite bands?  Is your taste in music comparable to what Seamus likes in the novel?

KTS: Wow, I'm really gonna lose some cred here. Yes, I shared a lot of the same tastes as Seamus as an alterna-teen but I don't listen to much of any of that stuff now. If I had to pick three faves, I guess they'd be Stones, Pixies, 70s Bowie (all phases of that decade of his career) and Dylan (tied for third). While writing, I listen to Chopin and Krishna Das. I practice in the Theravada tradition of Buddhism so most of what I listen to is the sound of silence and the yammering of my own head on the meditation cushion. Here is an essay I wrote about eight years ago about how The Stones' "Exile on Main Street" saved my life when I was trying to wean myself off the scene in my late teens (note: it talks a lot about what Chicago was like in those days, a far different town from what it is today):

http://streetlegalplay.wordpress.com/2010/03/08/finding-exile-on-main-street-a-patchwork-confessional/

JK: Would you ever want 85A to be turned into a film?

KTS: People have said it should be a movie but no filmmakers have ever approached me. I'd be open to it but it'd be hard to get Chicago to look the way it used to.

JK: 85A seems heavily influenced by The Catcher in the Rye.  Can you comment on that book and whether it is a good thing or a bad thing that people will inevitably compare it to that?

KTS: The truth is, when I'd read Catcher at 15, I liked it fine but I didn't think about it again until after I'd already written 85A, nearly 20 years later. I was 34-years-old and was taking a train from the south of France to Paris for my flight back to JFK. I'd already read all the books I'd brought with me on my trip and the station at Avignon had an English language copy of Catcher. I bought it and had read it cover to cover by the time I’d touched ground in New York. I was stunned by how I must have absorbed the book subconsciously as a kid. Next day, I talked to the editor in Minneapolis who only then started citing Catcher comparisons. That was fine by me, so we underscored the similarities on the back-cover copy, knowing people were going to form comparisons anyway. But, to me, the book is far more greatly influenced by Sillitoe's "The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner." 

JK: What advice would you give to a young writer in Chicago looking to get published for the first time?

KTS: You mean someone who already has a manuscript ready to submit? Just work on finding an agent through a directory. Gone are the days where you have to move to New York, get a no-pay job as an editorial assistant and sidle up to the Xanax-popping big shot. The industry is changing, formats are changing, indie presses are the new majors and living outside New York isn't much of a deterrent anymore. 

JK: The character of Brody paints a rather negative picture of people in the legal profession.  Do you have any experiences with attorneys that led to this characterization?

KTS: Didn't mean to leave that impression! My husband is a lawyer, some of my best friends are lawyers. I worked for lawyers throughout college and totally appreciated them signing my paychecks. I've been screwed over by lawyers and I've been helped out enormously by lawyers. They're no better or worse than anyone else. We're all just people!

That said, Brody is the type of guy who's popping his buttons over how he's fulfilled his parents' expectations by having worked his way into more advantaged, white-collar corners of society. You used to see that type of guy—they were mostly guys, males--a lot around the board of trade and as junior associates in law firms on LaSalle Street. They were kind of nouveau riche before they could get riche - and if you hung around enough, you'd hear a lot of the talk that would come out of their mouths and it was often pretty stridently racist and homophobic. Remember, this was the eighties. If racial stratification in Chicago is bad now, it was worse then; and as for LGBTQIAs, if they were going to be like that, then they deserve what they got - that was the accepted code of the road, not much different from Putin's Russia, although these guys tended to find street violence against gays to be a bit too blatant and it might cost them their jobs. (You even sense that Seamus, who wants so much to be cosmopolitan and to see racial unity, is still unlearning a lot of racist and homophobic attitudes. I did not disguise that in him.) Not everyone in those trades was like Brody but a lot were and I had grown up around a lot of those guys, ones who didn't grow up in rich families but who leveraged their white, heterosexual privilege for all it was worth on their way to making money. And God help a gay kid like Seamus who couldn't fill those shoes or toe that line. Fire and brimstone were just the warm-up acts for what their homes and neighborhoods had in store for them in those days.

JK: One of the more difficult parts of the book for me to accept was that Seamus's parents and brother could be so mean to him.  It seemed almost over the top to me.  Was this intentional, or do you feel that's just how people were in the 1980's (i.e. blatantly homophobic and non-supportive of countercultural types)?

KTS: Hmmm...it might seem over-the-top from the standpoint of today but it was not all that uncommon even as recently as the Eighties. David Sedaris writes about this well in one of his more recent essays, "Attaboy." He says of his upbringing in the Sixties and Seventies, "Self-esteem hadn't been invented yet." By the Eighties, there was only a dawning consciousness in the mainstream that maybe shaming and corporal punishment were bad for child or adolescent morale--commercials started coming on TV encouraging parents to count to ten before breaking out the belt, etc.--but these concepts were mostly accepted by baby-boomer parents, the new generation of yuppies who didn't want to see their kids raised the same way they were raised. Suddenly enrollment in Montessori schools goes up, individuality is encouraged and living-room coffee tables are decked with alluvial fans of Conscious Parenting magazine. This was still a pretty new idea by the Eighties.

Seamus' parents were older than those of his peers, they grew up in the Depression. He makes mention of how they were the children of immigrants and educated by autocratic nuns. It's the kind of thing Mary McCarthy writes about in "Memories of a Catholic Girlhood." In Seamus' parents' time, you didn't dare tell your parents that Sister Mary Holywater bloodied your nose in school that day, not unless you wanted a black eye on top of it. So when Depression-era children grew up to have kids, "spare the rod, spoil the child" wasn't considered child abuse, it was considered a good rule of thumb. If you couldn't whip your scions into shape, then you weren't whipping them hard enough. Add to this that Seamus' dad had been a marine a la "The Great Santini" - the threat of military school is always in his holster and he's exceedingly competitive with his fractious son.

The movement away from this mentality was still in its infancy by the Eighties. Old school authoritarianism was still alive and kicking ass in many American homes - though it's true it was on its way out. Kids started reporting their parents to the police. All this might seem inconceivable today but it was still practiced and applauded not so long ago by parents who came up in the lockstep Silent Generation, as Seamus' parents did. They called it tough love. There's a whole sociology embedded in these generational dynamics.

JK: Are you working on any new pieces of writing right now, and would you be able to comment
on the subject matter briefly?

KTS: Yes. I am writing a new novel, although it's been put somewhat on hold as I work with a wonderful new agent I recently got in Manhattan. We've known each other a long time and she's always encouraged me in the direction of personal essays and humor pieces. I've written volumes of them by now, so she's helping me to build a cohesive collection of them.

JK: What was the hardest part for you personally in the writing of 85A?

KTS: The book had been moving along swimmingly and I had a sense of how it was going to end. Then, at about two-thirds of the way through, there was a gap in the story that I did not know how to bridge. I set about trying to bridge it with 200-pages of pure, unadulterated shit, and then confidently completed the last several chapters. I then showed it to a well-known editor, who loved the first two-thirds and the final several chapters but made me wish I was never born for wasting her time with the shit chapters. I didn't know how to rebound from her drubbing until about a week later when the scales fell from my eyes and I knew what I had to do--just take out those 200 pages! It felt like a risk but I went in, excised the mamah-jamah tumor and ended up bridging the hitherto impassable gap with just four paragraphs! But if I hadn't written those 200 excess pages, I'd have never gotten those four paragraphs. And the book itself ended up being only 223 pages.

85A - Kyle Thomas Smith (2010)

I have mixed feelings about 85A.  On the one hand I want to recommend it because it is about as vivid a portrait of Chicago circa 1989 as you will find in a book.  It's also a pretty good coming-of-age story and a decent primer on how to live a "punk rock lifestyle."  On the other hand I can't quite call it an undiscovered masterpiece because...I don't know...it just seems to be missing something.

My friend gave me 85A sometime in November of last year.  He had gotten it from Center on Halsted, which is a non-profit organization that has a community space in Lakeview.  They were doing a weekly reading series called "Read All about It" in one of the youth groups and he was offered a copy.

COH provides crisis management services for LGBTQ individuals and have a number of youth support groups.  It is not surprising that my friend got this book from there, because it seems like the sort of place at which the main character of the novel, Seamus O'Grady, should have been a regular visitor.  Unfortunately it opened about 18 years too late.

The story takes place on January 23, 1989, and begins with Seamus waiting for the eponymous CTA bus to take him from his home in Jarvis Park to the El to his Catholic high school on the south side of the city.  I can't quite figure out the route--since apparently he takes the Blue Line (then known as the O'Hare-Congress line) and it doesn't seem to go near Ashland Ave. and Blue Island Ave., which is an intersection near his school.  But I am getting wrapped up in travel details.  I have to say I really liked the description of the escalator at the Logan Square stop because it is my home stop.

He lives in an upper middle class community and his parents are religious.  He does not seem to have any friends at his school.  He really only seems to have two friends: Tressa and Dr. Strykeroth.  The former is an artsy biracial girl who rescues him from a group of skinheads that jump him at the corner of Belmont and Clark near the "Punkin' Donuts" (this is one of my favorite moments in the novel because that Dunkin' Donuts is still there and it may be one of the famous fast food branches ever because of it); he also later loses his virginity with her.  The latter is his psychiatrist with whom he apparently has a sexual relationship.

This is a slight problem for me--not because it's sick or whatever, but because it's teased out like the reader isn't supposed to be clear on what's going on.  Like, does Seamus just go to visit him and cry on his shoulder and ask to be held?  Or are they having various kinds of sex?  Of course, a graphic description might be off-putting, but the scene with Tressa is pretty graphic, so I don't understand why Seamus doesn't blatantly tell the reader what is happening in that office.  In a sense, this makes the novel like Try by Dennis Cooper.  I say that the because the main character is gay but also has sex with a girl in it.  But obviously, Try is going for something quite different than 85A.  Still, it just seems tame by comparison.  If you're going to write about transgressive subject matter, I don't think you should beat around the bush, basically.

This book also reminds me of Crossing California.  Together, these books paint a wonderful portrait of Chicago in the 1980's.  I like this better than Crossing California because it's more compact, and less of an "award-winning novel" (i.e. like those movies that are made to win Oscars), but I like it less because it's not as intricately constructed--or at least doesn't appear to be.

Still, I read this book not long after beginning my recent stint at the CTA, and I found it very entertaining for its topicality.  I daresay this may be the ultimate "CTA Novel" though it is certainly not a history of the transit system.  Certainly there cannot be many other books named after bus routes.  Many, many people ride the CTA everyday.  I am sure that many of them would find this book to be at least of passing interest.  At the very least it would be the most ironic book ever to read while on the bus.

But I also take issue with an early scene:

"Finally!  The 85A's rounding Touhy Avenue.  Just when my thighs are freezer burnt and my balls have turned to dry ice.
Last time I asked the driver, 'What took you so fuckin' long?' he ordered me off the bus.  Refused to move til I got off.  Everyone's screaming at me.  He threatened to call the cops, so I got off.  Had to wait for the next bus.  Ended up thirty-five minutes late for school.  Got JUG.  Had to write out the St. Xavier Norms of Conduct twice and the tardiness policy three times.  It's the same asshole bus driver every morning.  So now, no matter how late he is, I have to just suck it up, flash my Student ID, deposit my token and fifteen cents and take my seat like a good little cunt." (11)

Maybe things are different today than they were in 1989, but if Seamus had reported the bus driver for ordering him off the bus, I believe that bus driver would be disciplined.  Bus drivers, like cops, are essentially public servants that are expected to put up with their share of bad behavior.  I read a case about a bus driver who was fired because she pushed an older man who had confronted her physically and had also been loudly directing racial comments at her.  She said she was wrongfully discharged but the arbitrator said you can never have a bus driver hit a passenger.  Now, Seamus is not getting hit, but that sort of behavior (stopping the bus and ordering him off) is unacceptable and I don't believe it's realistic.

Which is my main issue with this book.  My big criticism.  I just don't think it's realistic.  I'm sorry.  Some of it is absolutely wonderful and clearly drawn from true life.  But other details just seem too ridiculous to be taken seriously.  In particular, I do not believe that Seamus's father and brother would beat him as mercilessly as they do, and treat him with such cruelty.  It seems like everyone is a villain in Seamus's life and he has nobody on his side.

Now, I have to admit, I would be pretty mean to Seamus too, because he is kind of annoying.  He clearly is smart but he fails all of his classes anyways.  He doesn't want to have any kind of job but to write.  He has vague ideas about living in London and New York as a quasi-homeless artist who can get by on the kindness of others and he doesn't want to conform to any kind of "normal" life.  This is all well and good--I was like this too, and I am sometimes still like this.  But he does not have very many redeeming qualities apart from having a fair dose of artistic talent.  So that is another problem I have with the novel: cannot identify with the narrator.

Don't get me wrong.  I love the Sex Pistols and PiL.  I love Sid and Nancy.  I love all the musical references in this book.  But Seamus is just like Johnny Rotten in a way: a "fashion item."  He dresses and acts the part, but the book sort of highlights the vacuity of so-called "punk rockers."  Maybe this is just because Seamus doesn't hang out with a group of them, so you don't get the sense of the lifestyle like you might from reading Our Band Could Be Your Life or Lexicon Devil.  85A is basically a lot of posing done by Seamus.

Still, this book has a lot of heart, and would make a good movie.  It reads pretty nicely, though I think Seamus relies too heavily on the word "fuck."  The Wolf of Wall Street supposedly set a record with the number of f-bombs there are in it.  But that is a three-hour movie too.  This book might set a similar sort of record.  I understand he's a teenager but I couldn't help but feel the writing was sort of, I don't know, lazy because of it.

I don't understand the narrative "moment" either--I suppose it takes place at the final scene in the story.  But Seamus doesn't appear to be writing a memoir, or telling it to somebody.  I just don't get who the novel is addressing.  Clearly, the key referent for this book is The Catcher in the Rye.  This is basically the same novel, 50 years later, in Chicago instead of New York, and with a Catholic high school rather than a boarding school.  But Catcher is an adventure story of sorts--it's about 3 days in New York, and that's the plot.  My friend that gave me 85A said the problem with it is that it doesn't really have a plot.  At least until the end.

And the ending is great.  The last fifty pages are the best part of the book.  And the rest of the book isn't too bad, but it just feels random and sometimes (I hate to say this) cliched.  So I think I've adequately summed up my feelings at this point.  But a couple more passages:

"When I was a little kid, I used to go into a deep fuckin' freeze whenever I thought about death and being stuck in a casket some undertaker drops in the ground.  It scared the living shit out of me that buried dead might be the same as buried alive--and it'd be for-fuckin'-ever, just you and your lonely little corpse, stuck in one place under thick wood and mounds of immovable dirt, until the end of time, until the Second Coming--whenever that shit was supposed to happen.  Later, when I was about seven, I found out you could get cremated instead, so I went and told Mom I want to be cremated, have my ashes scattered to the four winds so I can at least get some elbow room when this trip is over.  She said Catholics can't.  Man, Catholics can't do shit, can they?  I think it's after she told me that that I first started checking apartment listings in the Sunday Trib, thinking I should move out.  Seven years after my cremation chat with Mom, I found myself right where I didn't want to be: flat on my fuckin' back in the afterlife, in a dark place, unable to move a muscle, probably for-fuckin'-ever." (37-38)

This is a nice example of Smith's ability to write very well, i.e. to explain a feeling that most of us have felt at one time or another and put it perfectly into words.

The other part of the novel I really like is Seamus's obsession with a boy named Colby that he met on the El.  There is a passage that was very similar to one part of my second novel S/M, and made me feel like a similar feeling was at work, i.e. writing about somebody and hoping they would one day read it and know they were the character and find you years later:

"It's been well over a year now.  Colby still hasn't called.  Not that I'm waiting by the phone anymore.  And I haven't seen him around since that night either, not even at the fuckin' Murphy's Law concert, where my eyes were peeled out of their fuckin' sockets for him.  And I've been back to the video room time and again and he never turned up.  He wasn't even at Medusa's when Ministry played.  Fuckin' everyone who's anyone was there!  Not him, though.  Who knows, maybe he moved.  God, I fuckin' hope not.  I so want to see him again.
I never told Tressa about the night I met Colby.  Never told her what happened with Narc.  Never told her about my attempts at a cockney accent and a new story.  But I did ask her if the name Colby rang a bell.  She said it didn't and asked me why I asked.  I said somebody told me some story about somebody on Belmont named Colby but I couldn't remember how it went.  I could tell she could tell I was lying.  I remembered the story.  Knew it fuckin' chapter and verse.  I was its author.  'Colby's coming with me to London': I nursed the story all last year.  I nurse it now, but not so much now that a year has gone by and the phone hasn't rung.  Yet my London Plans still stand if he ever wants to hear my pitch, if I ever see him on the L again, if we ever become friends.  I'll keep watching out for him at Irving Park station.  But I won't do a cockney accent next time.  That was just fuckin' stupid." (104-105)

In summary, 85A is a bumpy ride, but it is one that you may be glad you took.  This is a really good book for young adults, even though the language is very vulgar.  I know things are different in 2014 than they were in 1989, but there are still kids out there like Seamus who feel like nobody could ever understand them.  This book will show them that everything they're feeling is totally normal, and that they shouldn't give up hope that their lives will get better.  It's not a perfect book by any means, but it's a pretty good debut for Smith, and I would be interested to read his other books if and when they are published.