The Idle Book Club 11: Fates and Furies

[Chris]

The Idle Book Club 11:

Fates and Furies

The first full episode of the new Idle Book Club season tackles Lauren Groff's Fates and Furies, a novel depicting two surprising sides of a marriage—and Sarah and Chris frequently found themselves at odds as well. This battle of the sexes was endorsed by President Obama.

Fates and Furies by Lauren Groff

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[J.C.]

I'm about 40% through Fates and Furies. Pretty far from what I usually read but I'm really enjoying it. The writing has a really nice pace to it that just keeps me going.

[gregbrown]

Just finished the book, and man am I not wild about some of the plot stuff in the latter half.

 

  Reveal hidden contents

Sexual coercion seems like cheap storytelling these days, IMHO, especially when deployed like it is here to add grit and gristle to a character. It's especially compromised for appearing as a flashback in the second half, where it's relegated to backstory—or at least as close as this novel gets to ~backstory~.

 

Were any of the characters supposed to be enjoyable/lovable by the end of the first half, with the second half souring you against them by revealing their machiavellian backstory? Because the oomph of the plot twists was sapped for me by being reducible to "Remember how you disliked this character for one reason? Surprise, it's another, secret reason that makes them an asshole."

 

My overall impression as we started to enter the second half was that Lotto was an ignorant fool who left a cloud of disaster in his wake, and that Mathilde was either the wife he needed or the wife he deserved. Groff spends most of the second act arguing for the former, but I'm not wholly convinced. Again, phrasing most of her decisions as ~backstory~ tends to rob them of agency, especially given how we've already been given an entire narrative where they've been essentially ignored.

 

Once you start layering Chollie's schemes in there, it becomes this weird bit of one-upmanship that can't commit to being a thriller but still kinda wants to be just for plot's sake. There are things here that Groff could have honed in on if she wanted to—how money is deployed liberally to gain leverage through discovering secrets, how protecting someone through lies rarely protects them at all, etc.—but she never really committed enough to any of them other than the simplistic "wow everyone has secrets huh" that also drives a frustrating amount of the discussion I've read elsewhere online.

 

Granted, I was kind of skeptical of the novel going in—lyrical realism is not my bag and the book largely rides on its prose for the first half—but the structure and plot of the novel became increasingly important, and increasingly worrying as I read on. While I wouldn't say I loved Evidence of Things Unseen, I certainly enjoyed it a lot more as an exemplar of the qualities of the first half. And for the second half, Fincher's Gone Girl is hard to beat.

[Argobot]

  On 1/8/2016 at 8:13 PM, gregbrown said:

Just finished the book, and man am I not wild about some of the plot stuff in the latter half.

 

  Reveal hidden contents

Sexual coercion seems like cheap storytelling these days, IMHO, especially when deployed like it is here to add grit and gristle to a character. It's especially compromised for appearing as a flashback in the second half, where it's relegated to backstory—or at least as close as this novel gets to ~backstory~.

 

Were any of the characters supposed to be enjoyable/lovable by the end of the first half, with the second half souring you against them by revealing their machiavellian backstory? Because the oomph of the plot twists was sapped for me by being reducible to "Remember how you disliked this character for one reason? Surprise, it's another, secret reason that makes them an asshole."

 

My overall impression as we started to enter the second half was that Lotto was an ignorant fool who left a cloud of disaster in his wake, and that Mathilde was either the wife he needed or the wife he deserved. Groff spends most of the second act arguing for the former, but I'm not wholly convinced. Again, phrasing most of her decisions as ~backstory~ tends to rob them of agency, especially given how we've already been given an entire narrative where they've been essentially ignored.

 

Once you start layering Chollie's schemes in there, it becomes this weird bit of one-upmanship that can't commit to being a thriller but still kinda wants to be just for plot's sake. There are things here that Groff could have honed in on if she wanted to—how money is deployed liberally to gain leverage through discovering secrets, how protecting someone through lies rarely protects them at all, etc.—but she never really committed enough to any of them other than the simplistic "wow everyone has secrets huh" that also drives a frustrating amount of the discussion I've read elsewhere online.

 

Granted, I was kind of skeptical of the novel going in—lyrical realism is not my bag and the book largely rides on its prose for the first half—but the structure and plot of the novel became increasingly important, and increasingly worrying as I read on. While I wouldn't say I loved Evidence of Things Unseen, I certainly enjoyed it a lot more as an exemplar of the qualities of the first half. And for the second half, Fincher's Gone Girl is hard to beat.

 

This book trades on references to Greek mythology, for better and for worse. I don't think we're meant to see many of the events that happen in the back half as realistic, especially in comparison to what comes before it. In that way, this book really reminds me of A Little Life, another 2015 novel that layers more and more misery on its main character to the point where it becomes comical, but I think that comedy kind of is the point. 

[Hereharehere]

I for one cannot thank you guys enough for this recomendation. 

 

For me I knew nothing of the book and read thinking it was just his life story and then the doubleswitch!!

 

For me this ranks alongside jean de florette and manon de source as a story that only towards it end really unravels and shows you a completely different view from the initial character.

 

Am now reading Ferrante.

 

Do not go anywhere keep on doing the Book Club, loving it and looking forward to hearing the discussion and to hear everything I missed!!!

[Stack Smashing]

Finally ordered the book, should be here in a few days. Hopefully I will find enough time to finish it in time. Really looking forward to the Podcast as well as the book!

[nonstopintrospection]

Just finished up Fates & Furies (contracting mono is real crappy, but it does give you plenty of time to read.  I might finish a few more this month as well...)

I am super excited for the Idle Book Club to return!  It was possibly my favorite podcast when it was going.  The selections and following the books section of the forums transformed my reading choices in general, and I'm looking forward to the upcoming episodes and where they'll lead me.

I have some thoughts about the book, and I want to get them out before my impression fades, but I have lots of thoughts and not a great idea of how to order them.

I loved her prose at times, even sometimes moments that when I process them for a while seem a little cheesy struck me emotionally in flow. I felt most engaged and most impressed by the writing surrounding the couple living their life, and her description of the marriage.  It just resonated with me in a way that most of my favorite writing does.  That said, I think I walked away from the book with a bad taste in my mouth.

  Reveal hidden contents

I felt often almost a shift in tone and prose when the plot kicks in, and it made it hard to care about the characters.  As the schemes develop and the betrayals come in the writing becomes stale to me.  I see the way it could be comical or cartoonish, but it really fell flat in my experience.

I understand that a lot is going on structurally, some I saw, some I think went over my head, but sometimes when I read a book the structure seems to flow with the narrative and enhance it, and in this it seemed to hold back the power of the story and the characters when I noticed it.

Not caring much for the plot or the more bombastic nature of the book made the second half sting, especially for having been extremely excited to hear from Mathild's POV when I realized that was happening.  I think with Lotto I reveled in the moment to moment experience of the writing, the experience of their marriage, of his career, and I wanted to take a journey with Mathild in the same way.  Her experience of grief had some potent moments, but it felt overshadowed by the unraveling of the plot.  The ending bits of oedipal plot in particular felt rushed and unsatisfying, like a slideshow at the end of a movie.  The Gwinny viewpoint was interesting, but felt like a strange choice, short and out of place.

I wanted more of Mathild's experience of the marriage when Lotto was alive.  I thought in the second half there would be more of her experience of some of those moments of the first half, but it hewed more to the before and after.

I've recently been reading Pynchon and Farrante, and it was interesting to me to try and frame this book on a scale between the dark, relationship-driven grounded writing in Farrante, and the sort of manic, ostentatious characters and situations of Pynchon, and think about how this book has elements of both.  I think for me it actually detracts from the experience. Farrante makes me feel that world and characters in a way that this book seems to shy away from, and everything is so cartoonish and manic in Pynchon that I don't feel like I'm losing that grounding, and can totally focus on prose and structure and reference in a way I just found disappointing in Fates and Furies.

Trying to write about the book made me realize how disorganized my thoughts are about this book.  I am certainly glad I read it, and I enjoyed the experience of reading it, but I don't think I like this book.  I am really interested to hear what others think, and the podcast episode.

[Professor Video Games]

  Quote

She went out at night and picked up men. . . . The boy who sold gas at Stewart's, with his downy moustache and ability to pump for hours like a lonely derrick on the dry Texas Plain

 

*throws book out window*

[pabosher]

  On 1/22/2016 at 3:05 PM, video games said:

*throws book out window*

 

Is that an actual quote from the book??

[J.C.]

Oh yes it is.

[Nappi]

Well, at least she didn't settle for a gas pumping reference that was right there, and went for a more ambitious oil pumping reference instead.

[Woodfella]

I have the book! Took a while to arrive at my library. How long have I got? Gonna try and finish it before the podxast

[Lechimp]

I finished it a couple of days ago and really enjoyed it. I guess I agree with a lot of people here that enjoyed the first half more and wanted more of that, but I think that being aware of the tonal shift made it easier for me to adjust to the change and it ended up being a less drastic change than what I had expected.

[namman siggins]

I was interested in the book until I read that quote by video games. Christ.

Ah fuck it, I'll give it a try.

Now will y'all get more PoC writers for the book club? I highly recommend The Book of Night Women by Marlon James or The Moor's Accouny by Laila Lalami or Beauty is a Wound by Eka Kurniawan.

[Professor Video Games]

Nah don't skip it just based on that little bit. Only a few lines in the book bothered me (that one being the worst by far) and like nonintrospection said, there are some parts where the prose is really good.

 

Of course that being said, I had pretty mixed feelings on the book overall haha.

 

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I enjoyed reading about Lotto's youth, the struggles of their marriage, and the evolution of their social life. The book started to lose me around when Lotto met up with Leo Sen though. It was just way, way too melodramatic for my tastes and it's the point where Lotto went from a little naive but interesting to just a big baby.

 

And then the second half kicks into gear and while I was surprised that Lotto died I was ready to either get a similar treatment of Mathilde's life and/or learn about her as she tried to move on from Lotto, which it kind of does. But really it just went all in on this crazy plot with secret lives and twenty year schemes and an oedipal thing that I still don't get the point of. I think there were too many aha moments and the lack of focus really hurt things. The only thing these reveals did was confuse me about Mathilde's character and her and Lotto's marriage (except that the sex was definitely amazing). I came away from it all feeling like the book was trying to say something and I just missed it.

[ariskany_evan]

Finished!  Loved the book up until

 

  Reveal hidden contents

Lotto's play writing career took off.  Purely personally, I hate experiencing art about wild success in art.  Really gets me mad.

 

The perspective in the first half feels like a portrayal of Lotto, infected by Lotto.  I hate him, but that feels like I made the decision.  Lotto's section forgets and moves beyond bad moments as fast as Lotto could suppress them.  There's a really nice feeling of accumulation by the time he dies.  Hit that mortality button for me real strong.

 

I loved how before Lotto's success the book would shift perspectives halfway through paragraphs.  It had a fun, wild feel.  I figure she shifted away from that as Lotto and Mathilde became more isolated as they aged, it felt purposeful, but I missed it.

 

So, loved, then liked.  Happy to have read it.  

 

Question about the bracketed text:

  Reveal hidden contents

[suspend them there, in the mind’s eye: skinny, young, coming through dark toward warmth, flying over the cold sand and stone. We will return to them. For now, he’s the one we can’t look away from. He is the shining one.]

From the second chapter of Fates.

 

I never felt such a strong presence past this moment from the bracketed text.  I have in my head that it's a Greek Chrous?  My Greek lit knowledge is not good, so I'm curious if anyone has any theories on its presence.  And why it seems to dwindle in appearance and purpose as the book goes along...

 

Also my alma mater is all over this book!  They should have had better fact checking regarding the campus and Poughkeepsie, but otherwise I was happy to fill in the details with my own place-memory.

[gregbrown]

If y'all dug the sly narrator in the book, The Children's Hospital by Chris Adrian has a similar narrative voice that's really striking.

[juffowup]

Throughout the opening, I couldn't stop thinking of the opening line of Catcher in the Rye:  "If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, an what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth."  I don't know if the life story of Lotto's parents is going to turn out to be relevant, but since I read that line in high school it's felt weird to start a character's backstory this far before their birth.  I sure hope Mathilde gets the same treatment eventually?

[Nelsormensch]

Heh, I've been try to resist posting this, but it's all of think about when working my way through the book, so I'm going to try and purge this demon now and maybe I'll be able to focus on book again. Also, there's really no way to phrase this without sounding like a complete turdman, so I'm just going to go for it.

 

I'm closing in on halfway through the book and ... does it get better? I enjoyed the opening bits, but it's been a parade of increasingly unlikeable characters and uninteresting plot for quite a while now. With the exception of By Blood (and Hemingway, which is just so not my thing), I was totally into the Classic Book Club selections even though they weren't the kind of books I normally read. The praise for Fates & Furies was not insignificant but man, I don't really get it. Maybe there's a turn part of the way through and I just need to hear a "press on, brave one."

 

More details in spoilertown:

 

  Reveal hidden contents

I was pretty into the book at the beginning but once Lancelot gets to Vassar, I felt myself disliking basically everything more and more. It just feels like so much wankery!

 

Lancelot is beloved by everyone at the university he is attending for free and is so good at acting and has SO MUCH SEX (but don't worry, there's the throwaway mention of "If a woman acted like that people would call her a slut" so it's still progressive and everything is fine). But oh no, after graduating, he can't find much work as an actor and that's so sad and awful. But wait, with no effort at all, he discovers he's an absolutely amazing playwright and now he's incredible and amazing and everything is great. But oh no, he falls down some stairs and breaks his leg which is the worst thing that has ever happened to anyone ever. He's so sad and can't stop drinking while living in his massive country home. But wait, now he heard an opera that was the most incredible thing and now he's at an artist commune working with a wunderkind on a brand new opera that will be even more amazing and incredible. That's where I'm up to now, basically. And none of it is really interesting, it's just kind of stuff happening to a guy who seems like a big knob to me.

 

The book keeps saying he's impossibly charming, but he never seems to act charming at all, it's just asserted as being true. I find Lancelot is insufferably self-absorbed. And his relationship to Mathilde is supposed to be this incredible marriage, except I guess that means it's incredible just because they get to have lots and lots of sex. I'm no prude, but if I have to hear about panties being pulled aside one more time, my eyes are going to roll so hard, I'll never see straight again. All their friends also seem like douchebags and that's basically all the characters so far (aside from Lancelot's aunt and sister, they seem interesting during their brief appearances).

 

There are brief moments that are really great, like when the old lady upstairs heard L&M having sex outside her door (because that's seemingly all they ever do) and it was a really unexpected human moment. But that's almost the exception to the rule that the rest of the people and events are just so uninteresting and unlikeable.

 

And I don't think that characters need to be likeable or anything, but I feel like the book wants you to like Lancelot or at least empathize with him, heh, and just I don't at all. Flawed characters can be great and interesting, but Lancelot's flaws aren't interesting, he's just kind of a wanker.

 

People seem so into this, so I kinda feel like I'm in crazytown, but I also just find myself annoyed every time I start back into the book. What am I missing here?

[Argobot]

  On 2/4/2016 at 12:08 AM, Nelsormensch said:

Heh, I've been try to resist posting this, but it's all of think about when working my way through the book, so I'm going to try and purge this demon now and maybe I'll be able to focus on book again. Also, there's really no way to phrase this without sounding like a complete turdman, so I'm just going to go for it.

 

I'm closing in on halfway through the book and ... does it get better? I enjoyed the opening bits, but it's been a parade of increasingly unlikeable characters and uninteresting plot for quite a while now. With the exception of By Blood (and Hemingway, which is just so not my thing), I was totally into the Classic Book Club selections even though they weren't the kind of books I normally read. The praise for Fates & Furies was not insignificant but man, I don't really get it. Maybe there's a turn part of the way through and I just need to hear a "press on, brave one."

 

More details in spoilertown:

 

  Reveal hidden contents

I was pretty into the book at the beginning but once Lancelot gets to Vassar, I felt myself disliking basically everything more and more. It just feels like so much wankery!

 

Lancelot is beloved by everyone at the university he is attending for free and is so good at acting and has SO MUCH SEX (but don't worry, there's the throwaway mention of "If a woman acted like that people would call her a slut" so it's still progressive and everything is fine). But oh no, after graduating, he can't find much work as an actor and that's so sad and awful. But wait, with no effort at all, he discovers he's an absolutely amazing playwright and now he's incredible and amazing and everything is great. But oh no, he falls down some stairs and breaks his leg which is the worst thing that has ever happened to anyone ever. He's so sad and can't stop drinking while living in his massive country home. But wait, now he heard an opera that was the most incredible thing and now he's at an artist commune working with a wunderkind on a brand new opera that will be even more amazing and incredible. That's where I'm up to now, basically. And none of it is really interesting, it's just kind of stuff happening to a guy who seems like a big knob to me.

 

The book keeps saying he's impossibly charming, but he never seems to act charming at all, it's just asserted as being true. I find Lancelot is insufferably self-absorbed. And his relationship to Mathilde is supposed to be this incredible marriage, except I guess that means it's incredible just because they get to have lots and lots of sex. I'm no prude, but if I have to hear about panties being pulled aside one more time, my eyes are going to roll so hard, I'll never see straight again. All their friends also seem like douchebags and that's basically all the characters so far (aside from Lancelot's aunt and sister, they seem interesting during their brief appearances).

 

There are brief moments that are really great, like when the old lady upstairs heard L&M having sex outside her door (because that's seemingly all they ever do) and it was a really unexpected human moment. But that's almost the exception to the rule that the rest of the people and events are just so uninteresting and unlikeable.

 

And I don't think that characters need to be likeable or anything, but I feel like the book wants you to like Lancelot or at least empathize with him, heh, and just I don't at all. Flawed characters can be great and interesting, but Lancelot's flaws aren't interesting, he's just kind of a wanker.

 

People seem so into this, so I kinda feel like I'm in crazytown, but I also just find myself annoyed every time I start back into the book. What am I missing here?

 

Oh man, you need to read 50 more pages and then see how you feel......

[Nelsormensch]

  On 2/4/2016 at 12:20 AM, Argobot said:

Oh man, you need to read 50 more pages and then see how you feel......

 

Haha, okay, that's good to hear! I wasn't really planning on bailing, but at least now I won't feel like I've got an infinite highway of disinterest ahead of me.

[osmosisch]

For what it's worth, things only very briefly improved after those 50 pages as far as I was concerned. I'd still say the book is with finishing, but don't expect too much.

  Reveal hidden contents

the writing on grief was pretty good, and it was in one sense interesting to explore Aurelie's life, but it was even more caricatural than Lancelot's, and none of the characters became any more likeable or human. This book felt like a water of an excellent premise to me.

[WickedCestus]

I agree completely with most of the opinions presented here about the second half of the book. Overall, I'm left ambivalent. If it had been more focused, I think it could have been quite a good book, but the plot just got a bit too ridiculous. Ridiculous plots are all well and good, but it just didn't seem to fit the tone or scope of the novel. Really interested to hear the podcast; I hope you guys will help me think about the book in ways I hadn't considered. 

[dustincorreale]

  On 2/4/2016 at 12:08 AM, Nelsormensch said:

Heh, I've been try to resist posting this, but it's all of think about when working my way through the book, so I'm going to try and purge this demon now and maybe I'll be able to focus on book again. Also, there's really no way to phrase this without sounding like a complete turdman, so I'm just going to go for it.

 

I'm closing in on halfway through the book and ... does it get better? I enjoyed the opening bits, but it's been a parade of increasingly unlikeable characters and uninteresting plot for quite a while now. With the exception of By Blood (and Hemingway, which is just so not my thing), I was totally into the Classic Book Club selections even though they weren't the kind of books I normally read. The praise for Fates & Furies was not insignificant but man, I don't really get it. Maybe there's a turn part of the way through and I just need to hear a "press on, brave one."

 

More details in spoilertown:

 

  Reveal hidden contents

I was pretty into the book at the beginning but once Lancelot gets to Vassar, I felt myself disliking basically everything more and more. It just feels like so much wankery!

 

Lancelot is beloved by everyone at the university he is attending for free and is so good at acting and has SO MUCH SEX (but don't worry, there's the throwaway mention of "If a woman acted like that people would call her a slut" so it's still progressive and everything is fine). But oh no, after graduating, he can't find much work as an actor and that's so sad and awful. But wait, with no effort at all, he discovers he's an absolutely amazing playwright and now he's incredible and amazing and everything is great. But oh no, he falls down some stairs and breaks his leg which is the worst thing that has ever happened to anyone ever. He's so sad and can't stop drinking while living in his massive country home. But wait, now he heard an opera that was the most incredible thing and now he's at an artist commune working with a wunderkind on a brand new opera that will be even more amazing and incredible. That's where I'm up to now, basically. And none of it is really interesting, it's just kind of stuff happening to a guy who seems like a big knob to me.

 

The book keeps saying he's impossibly charming, but he never seems to act charming at all, it's just asserted as being true. I find Lancelot is insufferably self-absorbed. And his relationship to Mathilde is supposed to be this incredible marriage, except I guess that means it's incredible just because they get to have lots and lots of sex. I'm no prude, but if I have to hear about panties being pulled aside one more time, my eyes are going to roll so hard, I'll never see straight again. All their friends also seem like douchebags and that's basically all the characters so far (aside from Lancelot's aunt and sister, they seem interesting during their brief appearances).

 

There are brief moments that are really great, like when the old lady upstairs heard L&M having sex outside her door (because that's seemingly all they ever do) and it was a really unexpected human moment. But that's almost the exception to the rule that the rest of the people and events are just so uninteresting and unlikeable.

 

And I don't think that characters need to be likeable or anything, but I feel like the book wants you to like Lancelot or at least empathize with him, heh, and just I don't at all. Flawed characters can be great and interesting, but Lancelot's flaws aren't interesting, he's just kind of a wanker.

 

People seem so into this, so I kinda feel like I'm in crazytown, but I also just find myself annoyed every time I start back into the book. What am I missing here?

 

I just finished myself. In general  I wouldn't say I loved it, but I literally just finished a couple hours ago so it's still settling and unfolding.

 

One thing though, in response to your spoilered issues. I didn't realize this until halfway through for obvious semi-spoiler reasons, but even though it seems like an omniscient narrator, it's still basically Lotto's perspective. Maybe not his perspective, since there's still things he wouldn't know (the door sex scene for example), but still his ... outlook. If not through his eyes, then through his rose colored glasses. So it's a bit of an unreliable narrator, not just in the details, but also in the tone and impression of Lotto and what he deserves.  That's why it comes off as so aggrandizing and, in retrospect, dismissive of the rougher edges of their lives. Like for example his shitty friends, I feel like the tone of dealing with them was "yea they have some problems but they're not so bad" but that's because that's how Lotto feels about them, not (i don't think) how we are necessarily supposed to feel about them. 

 

This becomes more obvious once you hop out of Lotto's perspective. I might have wished I had that understanding of the skewed perspective earlier, but I think that's actually one of the things the book is "about". The intersection of individual perspectives, and how strongly your interpretation of events and your own past is influenced by what you imagine of yourself.

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Like how both he and Mathilde are convinced the other is going to leave them. I also found it interesting how Lotto's narcissism was the perfect environment for Mathilde's (and Antoinette's) shadowed manipulations. He just can't conceive of the world not serving him in the ways he expects and when it doesn't (like his injury or learning about Mathilde's past) it completely rocks him because he's so unaccustomed to the blinders coming off.

[Mangela Lansbury]

I'm only partway through this book, and my main criticism of it has nothing to do with the book itself. It has to do with the way it's written, which is making me think a lot about literary writing in general -- especially literary writing produced by people who have been through MFA programs. Specifically, it brings to the forefront of my mind the facts of the gentrification of creation. Sarah Schulman wrote about the gentrification of creation in her book Gentrification of the Mind, and I'll let her speak to this herself. On "[w]hat counterindicates professionalization programs from real art-making":

 

  Quote

One is the homogenization of influences. Students in an MFA program often are exposed to the same ideas and artworks as their classmates. They don't stumble through the world accruing eclectic influences, based on their own aesthetic interests, impulses, and chance. They lose the opportunity to fight to be influenced, to check out weird things and trail after unusual people. This creates homogeneity.

 

As I read this book, I can't help but think I won't remember who wrote it in 2 years. I'll remember it was a woman who wrote it, but probably not which one. Was it Rebecca Schem or Elizabeth Strout? Maybe Patricia Hawkins or Lauren Groff? This isn't really a specific critique of the author, but rather of the system that she is a part of: the professionalized writing industry, which has gentrified cultural production. We only seem to hear from one type of person with one type of writing, and Groff writes in a very MFA voice. I can tell that she's read the Western canon, and that she's adopted the modern "literary" voice. She experiments some, but not in a way that's earnest -- it feels like she experiments in a way that would fit the genre of experimental literature. These aren't bad things in themselves but I've grown tired of them.

 

I'm taking a break from this book, and hope that some distance will rejuvenate my interest in the second half of it. It's got a very strong core and the ideas it plays with are interesting, but its aesthetic is unappealing to me.