What I\u2019ve Been Reading Lately:<\/strong><\/p> Another re-read that might as well be a first read. I picked this up, must\u2019ve been 2010-11, because I know I was reading it on a boat. Big noir phase when I was working on the boats, maybe because our dock was under a bridge and a Big Bad (Trump Tower!) was upstairs. What I remember is 1) being assured this is a sensitive portrayal of people with Tourette\u2019s and 2) absolutely falling in love with the prose. If you\u2019re a fan of language games\u2014and 22-23-year-old Chris thought language games were the absolute goal of writing, big Salman Rushdie phase during that time, too\u2014you\u2019ll like this book. Also did I mention detective stories? It\u2019s a good detective story. I\u2019m talking, of course, about Motherless Brooklyn<\/em> by Jonathan Lethem.<\/p> Now, all that stuff I was saying up there about finding common ground with Lionel Essrog? I don\u2019t actually know anyone with Tourette\u2019s. Reading up on R\/Tourette\u2019s<\/a>, responses to this book (or at least its film adaptation) range from \u201cthis is a good portrayal of Tourette\u2019s\u201d to \u201cI\u2019m avoiding this because any portrayal will make my own tics act up.\u201d This is maybe a lot of, ahem<\/em>, throat-clearing to say: what writing in this book! This prose must be what reviewers mean when they use that \u201ctour de force\u201d cliche I despise. It is, like Bourdain, breezy while also being maximalist<\/a>. It is (also like Bourdain) deeply sensualist. Lionel is irritated and inconvenienced by his tics, but he also takes great pleasure in them. He is very in touch with his surroundings, at one with all of the stuff that makes us alive. I think I loved this book so much when I first read it because despite my quibbles (and some pretty real flaws), it is absolutely the kind of book I want to write. Not in a \u201cwhite writer goes Oscar-baity with portrayal of Tourette\u2019s sufferer\u201d way, but in a \u201cwhen I picture what a capital-N Novel looks like, this is close.\u201d That said, let\u2019s get into some stuff. <\/p> The novel has its 1999-isms: Brooklyn as a rough-and-tumble borough, an obsession with hardboiled tropes (was this a thing for everyone in the late 90s\/early aughts or was it just me? I don\u2019t feel like it was just me), Kimmery is not a real character she is a cardboard cutout of a spot on the Hero\u2019s Journey Wheel<\/a>, extended 25th Hour<\/a><\/em>-style<\/a>1<\/a> discussions of immigrant classes, a white author during the \u201cEnd Of History<\/a>\u201d period of the US using a few Diegetic N-Words, or parsing the exact meaning of the phrase \u201chalf a f-slur.\u201d2<\/a> All I\u2019m saying is be prepped for a very well-written detective novel that is also very 1999. <\/p> LINKS!<\/strong><\/p> Something to listen to while you browse? Why not this set of MF DOOM instrumentals from Oma? Or is it OMA? Either way, it rips. <\/p>![\"book:](\"https:\/\/substack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com\/public\/images\/250eebb1-04ee-40ea-81b3-6630ad41b733.heic\")
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