FRIDAY BOOKS 2.0

I had to speed read The Book of Dahlia by Elissa Albert because it was from my mom's library--the non-Brooklyn branch and she didn't want a fine. I hadn't heard of it; she got it because she read some great review of it or something. She lent it to me because she didn't get past the first twenty pages. I know why. It seems geared to people more my age than hers. It turns out I took a few yoga classes with Albert back when I was doing community yoga down on Atlantic Ave.

The book is as non-Jhumpa Lahiri as you could ask for. Not that I want every book to be like Lahiri, but Albert's writing is cool and cute and snappy with tons of pop culture references while Lahiri's feels more timeless and classic. Albert is a good writer but I didn't love the book. I found it readable because of the snappy writing but the characters were so unlikeable that I found it a bit tedious.

I'll admit that the conceit of the book is interesting: Dahlia Finger, 29 year old fuck up, who spends her father's money, smokes tons of pot, sleeps around, watches old movies religiously, gets diagnosed with a brain tumor. A serious, going to kill you, brain tumor. The first chapter is terrific--extremely tight in executing the plot and establishing the character. But while you sympathize with Dahlia for her illness, you never (ever) like her. I kept wanting her to change in some way and she never does. In a way this is interesting since one of the rules you often hear in writing workshops is that your characters need to change--even if the change is seemingly minute. I read somewhere that Dahlia is the anti-heroine of the novel and while I guess it's an interesting conceit and explains why she wouldn't change, I found her frustrating and tedious. Her relationship with her brother is a good example. They're best buds till he's a teenager and then he becomes a total asshole. From page 20 on, it's Dahlia's futile attempts to make her brother like her. Maybe 150 past that she realizes he's not going to change and from then on it's just this verbal diarrhea of what an ass he is. His assholeness is true, sure, but it's so extreme that he doesn't even feel real.

The same can be said for Dahlia's mother. She's so selfish that at some point around page 75 I felt like okay, how long do I have to spend with these awful people. But the writing is good and I guess that sort of saves it.

I read online that Albert's own brother had a brain tumor and it did make me feel a little differently towards to the book. Maybe more sympathetic. I'm not sure that this information should effect my reading of it but it did put it in a new light.

Now, I have nothing to read, which is a bit of a bummer. Luckily there's always Net Flix and TV.