I started reading on Saturday evening. Throughout Sunday I kept sneaking off to read a few more pages rather than pursuing the many more useful activities I could/should have been getting up to. I finished at ten past eight last night and lay on the bed feeling as if I'd eaten an entire chocolate cake in a day: how could I be so greedy? Now there's none left for tomorrow!
It's about love in the age of office superstores - which is the title of an upcoming book by Kyle Falconcrest, himself a character in Glove Pond, a work in progress by Roger, unhappy divorcé and Staples employee. As always, he's bang on the zeitgeist when it comes to all the little details and the characters' preoccupations. If you've ever read a book, had an ambition or purchased a ballpoint pen, you'll be able to relate. (Though you don't need to pay to get in to the Natural History Museum any more - fire your fact checker, man!)
When I read Generation X having already read a few of Coupland's later books, I felt that he'd used up all his ideas and imagery in this first novel and was endlessly recycling them, which discovery devalued the books I had read and enjoyed. I still see recurring themes in his work, but I now think he's gradually refining them, homing in on something big he's trying to say. When he gets there, I think the world will probably end. Or we'll all be enlightened. Or both.
[Doug! I just know you regularly Google yourself. Hi there!]
