Book #9: Water for Elephants, by Sara Gruen

Didn’t love it, didn’t hate it. I can see why it’s so popular, what with all the murder, intrigue, sexy times, and Prohibition (my dental hygienist loved it, so there ya go), but it’s not something I would have ever picked up if not for Cannonball Read. For one thing, it’s deadly serious, but I was in Publix with my mom’s credit card, thought, “Hey, free book!” and here we are.

OK, story. Jacob Jankowski is about to finish veterinary school when he finds out his parents are dead, and whoops, the mortgage they took out to pay for his education means he doesn’t have a home or a penny to his name. He logically hops on a random train passing by, and the circus shenanigans begin, with 93-year-old Jacob narrating from his nursing home. Young Jacob sees a performer, Marlena, being all pretty and sparkly, and of course falls in fucking love without even talking to her. And of course he wants to save her from August, her horrendous fucking bastard husband and his new boss. When he’s not being generous and charming, he goes into rages, beating people and animals alike. The head of the circus, Uncle Al, casually diagnoses him with “paragon schizophrenia.” Uncle Al is also a horrendous fucking bastard. He doesn’t put a high premium on either paying his workers or making sure they don’t get dumped from the train while crossing a trestle. He also doesn’t care if his animals have to go hungry temporarily, eat rotten food, or endure the aforementioned beatings of August.

Cruelty to animals is a litmus test here. Mean to animals? Villain. Nice to animals? Good. In fact, most of the animals are conflated with humans-they’re described as having human personalities, facial expressions, reactions, motives, etc. I guess I need to congratulate Gruen on that aspect, seeing as how Rosie the elephant was my favorite character, but it’s very possible that I simply have a giant weak spot for animal characters.

*I’m not one for love stories (ex: holy shit The Notebook was so fucking boring, why did people keep telling me it was better than a typical romance film?), so maybe I’m not the best person to judge, but Jacob and Marlena… I never completely understood or cared about them together. I accepted it because I had to, but he falls in love just because she’s purty, and she later admits that she’s been in love with him since the first time they met, which, ugh. It’s not based on anything substantial. And then they have sex, which, also ugh.

She presses a kiss into each palm and then places my hands on her breasts.
“Touch me, Jacob.”

When she undoes my trousers and takes me in her hand, I pull away.
“Please,” I gasp, my voice cracking. “Please. Let me be inside you.”
Somehow, we make it to the bed. When I finally sink into her, I cry out.

Yeahhh… Did not need that.

*The paragraphs with elderly Jacob were eh. I get why she framed the story that way-it creates a nice parallel, with him going from taking care of animals and an old man to being taken care of himself, but nothing happens, especially compared to all the excitement that takes place in the past. Thankfully these sections were relatively brief and infrequent.

*Probably the smartest thing Gruen did was put the murder in the prologue, because it creates an ever-present sense of tension. You’re always wondering what finally sets off the sequined female and who the unnamed man is, and it gives a sense of purpose to the story. I have a feeling that I would’ve been wondering what the point was otherwise, or else I would’ve thought it was a straightforward love story with an unusual backdrop and been turned off.

*The parts I enjoyed the most had nothing to do with Jacob, Marlena, and August, but with Rosie and the other animals, the pickled hippo, the parade for the deceased fat lady: usually nothing more than interesting diversions. I finished the book in the middle of a subway ride, so I continued on to the author’s notes, and guess what? All of my favorite details were true anecdotes Gruen came across in her research. That makes me want to find a good nonfiction book about old-timey circuses, because they seem fascinating.

*I felt some of the deaths were unnecessary, like Gruen was throwing in as much emotionally painful stuff as possible, just cuz.

*I thought the climax in the past was clever, and although I rolled my eyes at the second ending, I also went “aww” a little.

*The writing was decent, but in over 300 pages no one line made me stop and go “damn, that’s good.”

*Young Jacob occasionally mentions how he’s done horrible things that will send him to hell, but if coveting your boss’s wife and drunkenly vomiting on a prostitute is all it takes to send someone to hell, we’re all screwed.

Pages: 331

And yes, there is a book #8 that I haven't written up yet. I'll get to it tomorrow. Right after my book #2. ::coughcough::

I can't help it that I'm so popular

I went out with Brunette Roommate last night to a cool lounge-y place in the city. We only knew two people in our giant group of Indians, so the four of us spent the night playing Hangman and Word Twist on someone's iPhone. Because we are just that cool.

To drive home how much I absolutely belong in cool lounge-y places, the only outfit I could think of was one that I'd gotten from my mom while she was cleaning out her closet. The scarf, the dress, the leggings-all of it. It's probably a sign of something when your mom has cuter clothing than you do. A sign that you should STEAL HER CLOTHING. So I followed that sign, oh yes I did. And it opened up my eyes. (To the benefits of leggings.)

That's unfortunate

At my aunt's birthday dinner tonight, my wonderful mother pulled out some "cute" (read: embarrassing) letters I had written from camp. Things like: "Camp is great, except for last night when Jessie and I thought there were people outside our bunk who were going to kill us with knives. And then I thought my stuffed animals were going to come to life and attack me."* And at seven years old, asking my dad how our stocks were doing.

This all prompted my aunt to ask if I was ever homesick. I shook my head, because I was even a sentiment-free android as a kid.

Dad: We'd come up to camp to drop them off and Inferior Daughter would be crying and holding onto us...
Aunt: And Dropout would just go "Bye!"
Dad: Barely. She'd kind of look up, but she was just in the corner jackin' it.

I WAS JACKIN' IT. I guess I inherited my psychic abilities from the paternal side of the family, since he knew about Thor even before I did. But seriously, what an unfortunate way of saying that I was playing jacks.

*Uncle's response: You were doing mushrooms at camp?

You know it's really time when...

You and a friend are trying to work out the logistics of a pay-per-view PopeFight, and you ask if she knows any bishops. She says she doesn't know any Catholics. You are about to ask if bishops are Catholic, and then wonder to yourself if the pope is Catholic.

You know it's time to go to sleep when...

You're on FreeRice.com, under the "World Capitals" section. The capital is Kuwait City. One of the possible answers is Kuwait. You pick Iraq.

I'm sorry, starving people of the world and my 9th grade Social Studies teacher.

Pearl Necklace

What did you think of when you read that title? I'm guessing something dirty, amirite? I found a story I wrote as a kid titled "The Mystery of the Pearl Necklace." It's all about a lady who had a pearl necklace once, but now she doesn't have a pearl necklace, and she really wants a pearl necklace, so she's trying to find out who's responsible for her not having a pearl necklace anymore. Ah, the innocence of youth.

I also discovered some poetry that should've been selected for Poetry.com's selective and internationally acclaimed volume: My Pussycat

I once had a pussycat
It behaved well
I liked my pussycat
Sometimes it behaved badly
When it behaved badly, I spanked my pussycat
After I spanked my pussycat, she ranaway

I spanked my pussy. No doubt for being a dirty whore.

Stuff like this almost makes me want to start working with kids again, just so I can see the kinds of crazy shit they come up with.

Adventures in TV Repair

My father called me into his office. "When you get a chance, can you try to get my TV to work?"

Since I was already there (he's so sneaky!), I decided I might as well put my sleuthing skills to work.

"I can turn it on, but it only goes to OnDemand." He demonstrated by turning it on. It did indeed go to the OnDemand channel. I walked up to it, pressed the Channel Up button, and it went to the normal channels.

"Ooohh. What would we do without you?"

So basically, he was turning on the TV, seeing that it was on a certain channel, and instead of trying to go to a channel he wanted, he threw up his hands and deemed it broken.

Ah, family.

Words like buttah

In going through a mass of mostly useless papers, I came across an unopened envelope from poetry.com. I neither read nor write poetry, so I was confused for a few seconds. Then it all came back to me.

It was 2002, I was bored, and I somehow ended up following a link to that site. I was assaulted by a celebration of awful, awful poems, and I decided to make up some extra-awful ones and see how high of a rating I could get. I chose the nom de keyboard Ella Cinder, to make it obvious that it was a joke, and I'm positive I forgot all about it within a week.

When I opened the envelope today, this is what I saw:

Dear Ella,

I am excited to inform you that in addition to your selection for inclusion in a hardbound anthology, you have also been chosen to be one of 33 poets whose artistry will be recorded professionally as a special part of a new poetry collection, The Sound of Poetry. I am writing to get your permission to include your poem, "Winds," in this highly-acclaimed and internationally distributed three-album collection, scheduled to be released four weeks after we receive all permissions.

Ella, our Editors have personally selected this group of poems whose expressive quality would best exemplify the art of poetry through the spoken word.

Blah blah please buy this collection and tell your family and friends to buy it as well.

Highly-acclaimed, you say? Internationally distributed, eh? Let's just see about that. Thankfully, they included a copy of my "selected artistry," and I feel it is my duty to share my "diverse poetic talent" with the internet. Again. For a fun game, try to spot where I made things secretly dirty.

Winds
The ever-blowing,
Mowing winds
Rush through the sheen,
The keen senses
Alive in my body.
Winds flapping,
Slapping my askew
Sense of self
'Til it is
No more.
Children gather,
Adults congregate,
In front of
The uplifted dress
Of my soul.

Stirring, isn't it?

Book #7: Sellevision, by Augusten Burroughs

I still haven’t read Running With Scissors. I admit it. I started on Burroughs with Magical Thinking, and I went with Sellevision last week for the age-old reason of “it was shorter.” Overall, I was slightly disappointed. This was funny, sure, but the characters were a little too cartoonish for me, the various plot threads a little too meandering. I never had a strong idea about where the action was heading, if anywhere, even though a lot of big, life-changing stuff happens.

I did zip through it in a day, though. I’m thinking I discovered the magical secret of not getting bored halfway through a book: read shorter books. Go ADD!*

Centered around a fake, eponymous TV shopping channel, Sellevision skewers the Home Shopping Network/QVC milieu with its wacky, mostly immoral characters. FYI, this is one of the few times in my life when I will non-ironically use the word “wacky,” but how else to describe a book that opens with “You exposed your penis on national television, Max. What am I supposed to do?”

As you can guess, the main action is set off by a presenter on Sellevision Retail Broadcating Network accidentally falling out of his robe during Slumber Sunday Sundown. Max Andrews, like Burroughs, is a gay Barbizon School of Modeling graduate, and now he is alone and out of a job, with no practical experience to help him find another one. After the wiener-scandal erupts all over the front pages of the tabloids, the book follows him through failed interviews and one-night stands as he discovers that he’s essentially been blackballed from TV.

He resorts to radio and voice-over work, but even there he’s not wanted, and his agent caringly, inevitably, ditches him. Desperate and considering a sales job at Macy’s, he turns on the TV, where Leeza Gibbons is interviewing a man whose career Max impulsively decides to emulate. His eventual success in this area is both surprising and fitting.

He’s certainly not the only important character-his absence at Sellevision creates a vicious, perfectly manicured struggle for more airtime between the other hosts. Peggy Jean Smythe, an obliviously hypocritical Jesus-lover, is being set upon by sweetly condescending emails from a woman named Zoe. A mention of hairy earlobes sets off a furious bout of ear waxing as well as a frantic trip to the doctor. Peggy Jean’s form replies piss “Zoe” off more and more, and the insults and threats become increasingly graphic, sending perfect Peggy into a downward spiral of alcohol, Valium, and abusive self-waxing.

Ambitious newbie Trish Missions is always coincidentally ready to take over for Peggy Jean when she’s too shaken to go on air and, eventually, in rehab. Leigh Bushmoore is also benefiting from increased airtime, but this is more likely an effect of her affair with the married executive producer than anything else. (Issue: what I thought would be the climax of this storyline comes with 90 pages left to go.) Bebe Freidman was already Sellevision's top presenter, but she has problems of her own, namely that she’s a 40-something single.

Although I liked Bebe, not least because she kept reminding me of Mike Rowe’s stint on QVC, her storyline was the weakest for me. She places an online personal ad, and has an amazing, incredible time with the first and only guy to whom she responds. I’m not kidding about it being incredible. I found it, as well as their ensuing relationship, hard to believe.

This is a big spoiler, but it’s one of the few places where I had a real problem with the plot, so I need to get it out. Bebe and Eliot, her internet guy, have this great, immediate rapport, which is fine, but how likely is it that her first date in years turns out so well? And Eliot is a fun, handsome, financially-secure guy who is somehow single and answered her underwhelming personal ad… why? I’ve seen many reviews saying that Bebe and Eliot’s relationship is threatened by her spending problem, but that’s not true. They never have any issues, aside from a small “might be siblings” thing. It’s entirely unrealistic. I know Burroughs was trying to set up a "too good to be true" scenario so that we're waiting for the other shoe to drop, but once it does, it's immediately lifted, and we're simply left with a fairy-tale romance.

And honestly, how many Rosalinds married to a police officer in Brooklyn had to give up their first son for adoption around the same time and for the same reasons? Because we’re expected to believe that there were at least two, and that their kids end up dating and eventually marrying. Their sibling scare had no payoff or shock value, since I saw it coming from a mile away.

I don’t know what is going on with my reading choices, but almost everything I pick up these days turns out to have some sort of creepy or horrifying sexual activity in it. Anal rape (Myra), threatened anal rape (P.S.), people bewitched into sex (Anansi Boys, and Stardust, kind of), and now incest. At this point I would not be surprised if my cute little British travelogue by Bill Bryson turns out to contain a chapter on the illicit but irresistible sexual energy of grazing sheep.

OK, spoilers and rant over. Sellevision is deliberately over-the-top, so many of my issues with it can and have been excused by others. I was also legitimately shocked at the revelation of Zoe's true identity. I was a little underwhelmed by the book's “One Year Later” conceit, showcasing everyone’s happy but unusual endings, but overall it was enjoyable. It’s just not great.

I suppose that's what I get for choosing books based solely on length, but don't think that's going to stop me.

Pages: 229

*I don’t actually have ADD. Not that there’s anything wrong with that…

Pogs!

I found my old pogs! Remember pogs? I had some kickass pogs.


... Pogs pogs pogs.

Some things never change

Dear Diary: November 4th was a very important day for me and for everyone I know. On that historic day, I flew-on an airplane!- from New York to Florida and went to my parent's house. I’m helping them pack up for their move in a couple weeks, and you know what revisiting your childhood home means. Embarrassing kiddie stories!

First off, I found some old journals. Two of them are the exact same hippie shit, covered in smiley faces, flowers, and peace signs. I won one in middle school for some depressing vignettes I wrote (oh yes, look at me, fancy emo writer-girl), although I’m not sure how I ended up with two. It’s entirely possible that I stole the second one from a classmate who also won a writing award. Clearly this was an elite, unique prize.

I decided to make one a dream journal, the other a diary. Even then I was giving up on my fiction writing before starting; I wrote “My Storybook” on the inside cover, but that’s markered over and replaced with “Diary Diary.” There's also obviously no stories inside, unless I was subconsciously predicting that my diary would one day become a story told to others on the internet, in which case, spooky!

My dream journal didn't fare so well. I entered exactly two and a half dreams before abandoning it. That's still better than my Storybook Diary Diary, which only has ONE entry. One. In the screenplay of my life, these “journals” would be an excellent tool in foreshadowing my future blogging activity. And my academic activity, come to think of it, but in the grand scheme of things, the blogging is more important. Anybody who disagrees is an elitist terrorist sitting in your ivory tower on your ivory throne made out of elephant tusks, you elephant-murdering A-Rab.

And now, my first diary entry, in all its glory (warning: only a small portion of its glory):

Well, today’s my 14th B-Day, that’s why I’m starting this now, ya know, eez date to remember. I don’t feel any different. Well, I do, but I think that’s just PMS cuz I think I might get my per.*

Good to know I’m still the giant dork I was at 14, and that my overusage of the word “well” has been with me for almost a decade. “Eez date to remember”? Why would I need to remember the date I started writing in a journal? That's what the upper right-hand corner is for. Anypoo, I proceeded to complain about my parents, my sister, and my body for three pages, so… no change there. I even wrote out dialogue! With colons!

I closed with this inexplicable line: “It’s really late, so I’ll finish tomorrow, no school, funeral, explain later.”

With storytelling abilities like those, it's no wonder I won a writing award! Even then I was promising follow-ups to stories that I would never deliver. Only this time I was promising an explanation to myself. This was before Harry Potter, so it’s not like I thought my journal was talking to me through invisible ink and slowly sucking out my soul through my words. (Good luck trying to get my soul, future evil journal-Horcruxes. If you can find something resembling one, it’s all yours.)

On the back cover I drew Donald Duck. And some bows, which apparently belonged to Daisy Duck because I wrote out “DAISY’S BOWS” next to them. Message to past self: thank you for not pursuing art.

Oh, and then I found a keychain featuring a picture of… drumroll please… Ricky Martin! Signed, too, eeee! This is so becoming my main keychain from now until eternity. He’s so dreamy!

I have to go to dinner now, so I’ll finish telling you all about the rest of my findings later, Diary.

P.S. Big ups to Jon and his nonessential striking of buttocks with feet for realizing my genius and knowing that the only appropriate way to honor it is with hours of cybersex over a webcam. (Hint hint.)

*For those who want to know, I was not, in fact, getting my period. Aunt Flo didn't visit me until two and half years later.**
**I KNOW, RIGHT? SIXTEEN?! What am I, a mutant?

Halloween

Because what else is anybody talking about? What can I say, I'm a follower.

Hallopenis started around 8:30 for me, when I called TAB to confirm that she'd be leaving soon, put together my Ashley Todd costume (complete with clipboard and list of questions to ask strangers*), and... sat around for 2 hours getting progressively antsier. Because TAB lieeeeeed. I finally was instructed to be at the bar at 11, so I did half a shot of awful, burning Svedka, washed it down with a refreshing half-shot of Belvedere, and went jauntily on my way, making sure to be 20 minutes late.

That still wasn't late enough, so I spent 10 minutes accepting costume kudos from the bouncer and waiting some more, but I think you get the idea that I had to spend a buttload of time waiting for TAB and her roommate to put together their costumes in a Starbucks bathroom. (I still don't understand the reasoning behind that decision.)

The next few hours went by quickly-taking advantage of the open bar, reassuring a skeleton that I could illegally register him from beyond the grave if he promised to vote for McCain, poorly investigating some Republican hunters' fake IDs, taking glamour shots with Sarah Palin (a true honor), meeting Switzerland, doing unwise shots of tequila, and finding out that Switzerland likes small, perky breasts.

Around 1:00, or 3:00, we ended up at Switzerland's apartment for some ancient Swiss herbal remedies. This is when things, as it were, took a turn. I took one hit and instantly felt woozy. I stumbled to the bathroom, possibly with someone else's aid, and commenced with the ritual tossing of the cookies.

You know how when you're drunk and sick, you feel better once you vomit? Yeah, that did not happen. I kept on leaning over the toilet, barely able to squeak out "need hospital" between what I'm relatively certain were sobs, for somewhere between twenty minutes and two hours. Once I was able to sit up for five minutes, Switzerland escorted me down the stairs. I promptly laid down on the sidewalk while TAB went to find a cab. She nabbed one, threw our stuff in it, and came back to hoist me up.

That is when the cabbie drove off. With all of our shit. In his backseat.

That is when TAB ran off after the cab.

That is when I started blindly walking after her.

That is when both she and the cab disappeared.

And that is how I ended up alone, barely conscious, without my phone, Metrocard, or wallet, surrounded by fake cops, and certain I was going to die right then and there, for my corpse to be trampled over the next morning by people on their way to and from Grand Central.

-Read the thrilling conclusion to my ladylike Halloween evening tomorrow!!! Did I make it home alive, and without being molested on the sidewalk?! Was I finished throwing up?! What exactly was that animal I stepped on?! All these questions and more will be answered!!!!-

*Ex: "Do you hate women?" "Are you a commie?" "Do you want naked gay men having anal sex on your front lawn and converting your children to homosexuality?" "Do you want to make out with me?"**
**What?! What if the stranger is hot?

Book #6: Franny and Zooey, by J.D. Salinger

OK, so I am branching out after all. I've never read Salinger, and decided to start with Franny and Zooey, which is shorter than Catcher in the Rye by about 100 pages and therefore more pertinent to my Cannonball Reading interests.

The book is divided into two sections. The first, "Franny," shows Franny Glass visiting her boyfriend Lane Coutell at college. After a brief meeting at the train station, the rest all takes place at lunch. Lane is somewhat of a pretentious twit; he takes Franny to the right, intellectual spot, proud to have a "right-looking girl" with him, and blathers on about a professor who, in his opinion, doesn't know shit from shoeshine. Franny's also pretentious, in an "I'm too artistic for college" way-she's sick of all the egos and fake poets who don't "leave something beautiful after you get off the page." She seems to have lost all interest in Lane, and her guilt over that causes her to swing between overly sweet and overly antagonistic.

Both of them take turns talking at length, but neither really listens to the other. Lane spends 15 minutes talking about a paper he wants to publish, only to have Franny ask for his martini olive. Franny describes The Way of a Pilgrim, a book about a man traveling across Russia while continuously practicing the Jesus Prayer, only to have Lane admonish his frog legs to hold still.

This first chapter shows the beginning of Franny's nervous breakdown. She's anxious and sweaty the entire time, she cries in the bathroom, and she finally faints as they're leaving the restaurant. When she comes to and is left alone for a minute, she begins silently reciting the Jesus Prayer to herself, and this is where "Franny" ends.

"Zooey" picks up a couple days later. Franny has come home, to her parents and her older brother Zooey, and spent her time crying and praying non-stop. While "Franny" was narrated by an anonymous third-person, "Zooey" is narrated by the second-eldest Glass brother, Buddy, and holy cow is he long-winded. Yes, he's aware of this, but that still doesn't make me any more interested in spending a full page on the contents of the Glass's medicine cabinet. I'm sure it's a fascinating, insightful list, as far as lists of objects in cabinets go, but at the end of the day it's a long-ass list that I could do no more than skim.

This chapter opens with Zooey reading a letter in the bathtub. The 13-page letter is Buddy's attempt at apologizing for fucking up Zooey and Franny. Apparently Buddy and the oldest, late Glass brother, Seymour, took over F and Z's education and made it all about religion and spirituality. Seymour's ghost, and the Glass kids' early exposure and domination on "It's a Wise Child," a radio quiz show, hangs oppressively over almost everything in this chapter.

Zooey's mother Bessie barges in on him and proceeds to chain-smoke and fret over Franny while dodging Zooey's insulting, sarcastic comments to her. This one ostensibly simple scene lasts almost 70 pages, yet didn't get boring. It sets up Zooey as a hideously insensitive, too smart for his own good jerk quite well. The action, if I can call it that, moves to the living room, where Zooey wakes up Franny and proceeds to spend 50 pages alternately bitching about how nobody in show business is a true artist and hectoring Franny about how she doesn't really understand the Jesus Prayer, or Jesus himself.

Oh god, I would despise Zooey if I ever had to share a dinner table with him. Blathering on about how nothing on stage or film or, especially, TV, is good, or beautiful, or real art. What a pretentious, sarcastic, artsy-fartsy bastard, I would mutter to myself under my breath. At one point, while talking to Franny, he looks out the window and sees a dog searching for a little girl. He marvels at the "sublime" scene taking place on the street, unhampered by writers or directors, and I couldn't help thinking of Ricky Fitts in American Beauty, talking about the beauty of a grocery bag floating in the wind.

Anyways, "Zooey" wraps up when he walks into Buddy and Seymour's old bedroom and calls the living room from its private line, pretending to be Buddy for Franny. Franny spends some time bitching about Zooey to Buddy-Zooey on the phone before realizing who it really is, and then they bond over a shared interpretation of some advice that Seymour gave them as children. Like the previous chapter, this one ends with Franny lying down, staring up at the ceiling, but she's no longer muttering the Jesus Prayer to herself, simply smiling until she falls asleep.

Now that I've spent ages describing my shortest book yet, I'll admit that I don't know how to react to it. Is it a character study? Philosophical debate? Religious enlightenment story? Whatever it is, I do know there's a lot of inaction going on, unless you count lips flapping endlessly. Both siblings talk about how they know better than to act the way they do, yet can't stop-this is underscored in Zooey's movements being described as those of a marionette. Zooey, for example, knows that he goes on at length and sucks the fun out of things... you know, he put it best himself, so I'll quote him:

"We're freaks, that's all. Those two bastards got us nice and early and made us into freaks with freakish standards. We're the Tattooed Lady, and we're never going to have a minute's peace, the rest of our lives, till everybody else is tattooed, too. On top of everything else, we've got 'Wise Child' complexes. We've never really got off the goddam air. Not one of us. We don't talk, we hold forth. We don't converse, we expound. At least I do."

There really is a lot of uncommunication, a lot of talking to somebody who's not there in this story. Lane essentially talks to himself during lunch, Franny doesn't even look at him when she's talking, Bessie muses out loud in the bathroom, Zooey ignores Franny's pleas to stop being an asshole. Letters, a form of fractured, distant communication, figure prominently in both sections, Zooey has a habit of calling people "buddy," as if he's always talking to his absent brother no matter who's actually in the room with him, and of course all the children grew up performing for anonymous people listening to them on the radio. Zooey even has to leave the room, call Franny on the phone, and pretend to be somebody else to be able to ask her how she is and actually wait for an answer.

F and Z was engrossing, and pages flew by, but I'm overall I'm not sure if I liked it as much as I respected it. There were certain turns of phrase that I loved, though, and I'll leave you with some of them, since this review isn't quite long enough.

Bessie closed the door behind her instantly, as someone does who has been waging a long, long war on behalf of her progeny against post-bath drafts.

A minor groundswell sounded behind the shower curtain, as though a rather delinquent porpoise were suddenly at play.

Franny was still stroking [the cat] Bloomberg, still succoring him, forcibly, into the subtle and difficult world outside warm afghans.

'The cigars are ballast, sweetheart. Sheer ballast. If he didn't have a cigar to hold on to, his feet would leave the ground. We'd never see our Zooey again.'
There were several experienced verbal stunt pilots in the Glass family, but this last little remark perhaps Zooey alone was coordinated well enough to bring in safely over a telephone.

Pages: 201