Erasure
by Percival Everett
(Hyperion)
A savage attack on literary politics, book awards, book reviewing, American taste, and racisms both reverse and full-speed-ahead. One warning: the finale is, probably appropriately, almost unreadably bitter. An “experimental” novelist, Everett makes fun of himself, as he would just about have to, and has been in the shadows too long. This was supposed to be his breakout novel, one gathers. Alack…
Lightning Field
by Dana Spiotta
(Scribner)
Spiotta’s novel should be subtitled Sticky Tar Pits of Ambivalence, LA-Style. Her characters grapple with idea of self-perception, as it’s been altered by media saturation and the possibility of being “other than” with the help of plastic surgery, lifestyle stylists and internalized movie moments. Everyone’s running old celluloid prints in their head, and the result is a spooky, spreading anonymity.
Crow’s Eye View: The Infamy of Lee Sang, Korean Poet
Translated by Myong-hee Kim
(The Word Works)
Those who think Myung Mi Kim and Theresa Hak Kyung Cha are the last word in Korean-born textual innovation—and deep down, admit it: most of us do—should seek out this selection of circa 1930s head-scratchers. The most puzzling of the batch: “Poem No. 4” (“Symptom of the Patient’s Malady”), consisting almost entirely of an 11 by 11 grid, numbers moving from 1 to 0 (i.e., 10)—reversed as if seen in a mirror, and...
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