A nihilistic work whose central plot is overcome by rambling monologues about the troubled state of humanity.
In Bloom’s novella, an agent named Higgins, alias Mats Odon, works as customer relations for the powerful Mammoth organization, and his loyalties to both corporate and revolutionary causes result in a dramatic unravelling.
Having done many dubious tasks for Mammoth before, Higgins concludes that his latest assignment is “to be his last.” His character is counting down the final 89 days in his posting, ignoring corporate backstabbing and “a leaked coup” to focus on completing his assignments. The mysterious corporation has a powerful reach, both across the media and in individuals’ lives, with Higgins reflecting: “There was no destination to escape to. He’d still be seeking some thing and this was not a bother, only a truth.” Assuming his latest identity, Mats Odon, amid corporate pen-pushing, he reflects on “the revolution”—a movement of which he may once have been a part. However, he gave up its actions for a comfortable life with plenty of perks: “Selling out did not bother him.” A surprise meeting with Damascus Dieter, his billionaire boss, results in a deal of “a signing bonus and extra income, without extending his stay.” Soon, he meets an old revolutionary friend, resulting in Odon becoming “an agent double entwined,” going off the grid and selling out once again. After a blurry interlude of drinking, cigarettes, women, and implied drug-testing with a motley bunch of men—Gorey, Meyer, Alexey, and the Vet—the protagonist feel that he’s “lost his cool. He needed structure.” He tries to maintain the relationships in both halves of his life but feels as if he is in a “perpetual hallucination shared with witnessing pretenders.” As deceptions and realities become blurred, a dangerous drug Isos is nearing the mass market—and Odon is in danger of becoming addicted.
The conversations between the protagonist and other agents are straight out of a noir novel: no niceties, all punchy exchanges: “You dance behind closed doors in another man’s office” and “Shoddy work. Fucking goons. Never left anything right.” This makes the contrast between most characters and Tara Thames, a data analyst in the company, all the starker, as she discusses orgasms and sexual desire with her friends. The reader traverses through the hazy plot and the main character’s cynicism, all dispersed over short, snappy chapters. Between the rambling internal monologues and the switches from first- to third-person perspectives, Bloom ends up evoking the same ennui in the reader that the characters experience. Monologues are punctuated by references to George Bellows and Everett Shinn, two American realist painters known for their depictions of urban life, which seems to be a touchstone for “testosterone fueled madness” for Odon. Unlike the output of these painters, Bloom’s work is impressionistic, relying heavily on the vague shape of a plot instead of a solid, sustained one. Ostensibly a commentary on the soullessness of corporate America and the immoral pharmaceutical industry, the book’s salient points are obscured by the stream-of-consciousness style.
A nihilistic work whose central plot is overcome by rambling monologues about the troubled state of humanity.Pub Date: Oct. 10, 2024
ISBN: 9781944527952
Page Count: 136
Publisher: Natural Press
Review Posted Online: June 10, 2025
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Uneven but fitfully amusing.
Betrayed by her husband, a severely depressed young woman gets drawn into the over-the-top festivities at a lavish wedding.
Phoebe Stone, who teaches English literature at a St. Louis college, is plotting her own demise. Her husband, Matt, has left her for another woman, and Phoebe is taking it hard. Indeed, she's determined just where and how she will end it all: at an oceanfront hotel in Newport, where she will lie on a king-sized canopy bed and take a bottle of her cat’s painkillers. At the hotel, Phoebe meets bride-to-be Lila, a headstrong rich girl presiding over her own extravagant six-day wedding celebration. Lila thought she had booked every room in the hotel, and learning of Phoebe's suicidal intentions, she forbids this stray guest from disrupting the nuptials: “No. You definitely can’t kill yourself. This is my wedding week.” After the punchy opening, a grim flashback to the meltdown of Phoebe's marriage temporarily darkens the mood, but things pick up when spoiled Lila interrupts Phoebe's preparations and sweeps her up in the wedding juggernaut. The slide from earnest drama to broad farce is somewhat jarring, but from this point on, Espach crafts an enjoyable—if overstuffed—comedy of manners. When the original maid of honor drops out, Phoebe is persuaded, against her better judgment, to take her place. There’s some fun to be had here: The wedding party—including groom-to-be Gary, a widower, and his 11-year-old daughter—takes surfing lessons; the women in the group have a session with a Sex Woman. But it all goes on too long, and the humor can seem forced, reaching a low point when someone has sex with the vintage wedding car (you don’t want to know the details). Later, when two characters have a meet-cute in a hot tub, readers will guess exactly how the marriage plot resolves.
Uneven but fitfully amusing.Pub Date: July 30, 2024
ISBN: 9781250899576
Page Count: 384
Publisher: Henry Holt
Review Posted Online: Sept. 13, 2024
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
SEEN & HEARD
A tender and moving portrait about the transcendent power of art and friendship.
An artwork’s value grows if you understand the stories of the people who inspired it.
Never in her wildest dreams would foster kid Louisa dream of meeting C. Jat, the famous painter of The One of the Sea, which depicts a group of young teens on a pier on a hot summer’s day. But in Backman’s latest, that’s just what happens—an unexpected (but not unbelievable) set of circumstances causes their paths to collide right before the dying 39-year-old artist’s departure from the world. One of his final acts is to bequeath that painting to Louisa, who has endured a string of violent foster homes since her mother abandoned her as a child. Selling the painting will change her life—but can she do it? Before deciding, she accompanies Ted, one of the artist’s close friends and one of the young teens captured in that celebrated painting, on a train journey to take the artist’s ashes to his hometown. She wants to know all about the painting, which launched Jat’s career at age 14, and the circle of beloved friends who inspired it. The bestselling author of A Man Called Ove (2014) and other novels, Backman gives us a heartwarming story about how these friends, set adrift by the violence and unhappiness of their homes, found each other and created a new definition of family. “You think you’re alone,” one character explains, “but there are others like you, people who stand in front of white walls and blank paper and only see magical things. One day one of them will recognize you and call out: ‘You’re one of us!’” As Ted tells stories about his friends—how Jat doubted his talents but found a champion in fiery Joar, who took on every bully to defend him; how Ali brought an excitement to their circle that was “like a blinding light, like a heart attack”—Louisa recognizes herself as a kindred soul and feels a calling to realize her own artistic gifts. What she decides to do with the painting is part of a caper worthy of the stories that Ted tells her. The novel is humorous, poignant, and always life-affirming, even when describing the bleakness of the teens’ early lives. “Art is a fragile magic, just like love,” as someone tells Louisa, “and that’s humanity’s only defense against death.”
A tender and moving portrait about the transcendent power of art and friendship.Pub Date: May 6, 2025
ISBN: 9781982112820
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Atria
Review Posted Online: July 4, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: yesterday
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