What to say about this book? I read it in a series of sustained late-night bursts. And there's something about the flowing, almost stream-of-consciousness prose that fit. Like Blonde on Blonde after midnight. Thin, wild, mercurial.
Most of all it was wonderfully, tightly, observed. Not much happens (though plenty of things occur) - but it's the narrator's perception - and how close he gets to the unspoken (but thought) - that matters. Simple scenes - the opening, with him walking along the High Line with his editor. Visiting Marclay's "The Clock." Working the Park Slope Food Co-Op (his line about the surly cashiers brought me straight back to Brooklyn) - and falling into a deep conversation with a co-worker. A residency in Marfa, that surreal Brooklyn-cum-West Texas.
And he threads that thin line between fiction and poetry and life. Like Bolano, who started as a poet, there's a remarkable precision of language. I liked living in his world. Seeing with his eyes. And so, now onto Leaving Atchoa Station.. and then, perhaps, back to Stegner and Crossing to Safety.
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