Girl With Curious Hair

Girl with Curious Hair – Did Not Finish:

I really loved Consider the Lobster (even with the sometimes excessive length), so I started this collection with a lot of enthusiasm—but it honestly turned out to be a disaster.

There are super long, monotone stretches that pushed me to the limit of resistance, and I had to give up about one-third of the way through to avoid falling asleep. Yes, the English is immaculate, and the setups are interesting, but everything else feels diluted to the max.

It's not a good book. The stories are virtually boring and back and forth and terrible. The worst of D.F. But the last one is pretty much alright. So just skip the whole of the book and read the last bit which is more like a novella rather than a short story. Reading it feels a bit like putting your head in a microwave and calmly waiting for something to happen. Sometimes D.F. is too much and all over the place but, at the same time, this is the exact joy and genius about him. The story perfectly nails down this scratchy feeling when you leave your house/flat/condo in the morning, the outside is absolutely white and blinding, and everything feels off and every thing FEELS altogether at the SAME time and your skin is almost folded over your body like a dry perfectly smoothed-out foil. It's fucking insufferable.

I really liked this collection of short fiction. It's a complex yet lovable exploration of literature and human connectedness. Definitely a good place to start before jumping into Infinite Jest– similar stylistically and thematically.