Robert Grudin

This book is super weird. I can't describe it, so I'm including the book's description:

The English department at the University of Washagon is in a uproar. Professor Adam Snell - humanist, scholar, gadfly and faculty pariah - has disappeared without a trace.

Stranger still, all copies of his obscure but brilliant novel, Sovrana Sostrata, also seem to be missing.

Has Snell been murdered? Has his book been murdered? And, more important, if Snell is not dead, does his department have the power to fire him at his upcoming post-tenure review?

So begins Book, a hilarious academic caper that lampoons clever critical theorists, spoofs the New York book-publishing scene, parodies at least seventeen separate literary forms and unleashes Frank Underwood, a deranged theorist with a high-powered target pistol - and a pathological hatred for Adam Snell.

And that's just for starters.

Book also contains [...], a genetically engineered garden weed, a power-crazed, sexually dazed chairwoman, a novel accused of rape and a revolt of footnotes that halts the text.

Honestly, the footnotes are the BEST part of this book. For too short a time, they are the Aeslin mice of weird academic satire. They alone are responsible for the extra 1/2 star. 1/2 star was deducted because of violence against animals - the scene was abrupt, short and shocking. It was over before I realised it happened; otherwise, I'd have DNF'd on the spot. Grudin didn't need to include it to make the story work, so I'm left with feeling like a brilliant, funny book is badly dinged by the gratuitous violence. I'm also rating 1/2 star generously, because satire does not always come easy to me, so some of the things that felt off to me, I'm giving the benefit of the doubt; I might have just missed the point.

Otherwise, the book was just weird. Weird and fun. The third person narrator is Grudin himself, telling the story about Adam Snell, who also interacts directly with the reader. The chapters of narrative are interspersed with chapters of what can only be described as randomness, but I found if I just went with it, it worked. The randomness was often amusing, sometimes pertinent to the story, and provided a nice breather - much like putting a book down would do, but without losing your sense of place. Between each chapter are small sections relating the history of books and bookselling, excerpted from the Encyclopedia Brittanica.

I really don't know how to describe it with any accuracy, but it's a great read, especially if you have spent any time working in higher education; the university politics and personalities are spot-on. But if you don't like, or are not in the mood for, non-traditional story structure, you might want to give this book a pass. The author plays with the story's structure, makes it part of the satire and humor, and if a loosey-goosey structure isn't your thing, Book: A Novel is going to irritate you.

And really, this might be the only book you'll find a footnote proclaiming: "Call me Ishmael. I was once Melville's footnote."… (més)

Grudin bemoans our inability to integrate past, future, and present. He isn’t just advocating what is usually called “living in the present” and in fact thinks the present can be something of a tyrant: “the present abhors precedents and is always trying to deny or obfuscate the existence of pattern. It claims to be a unique case, demanding special treatment and unusual indulgences” (37). What he seems to mean by integrating the past is keeping track of it and consulting often where one has been—late in the book he counsels keeping a journal. What he seems to mean by integrating the future is that we should build it up by regular adherence to a schedule for projects: “the future is the domain of sincere and persistent individuals” (136). Mostly he is commenting on the mistakes we make regarding time, but he has some specific suggestions or exercises, some of them interesting. He suggests trying to reconstruct a period or event with all its details of place, mood, clothing, state of health—and then going beyond this to a reconstruction “on a broader scale with the aid of old newspapers and magazines” (54). But his suggestions can also reveal a deplorable lack of human experience: “Insomniacs, for example, should regularly address their thoughts to some difficult problem; in so doing they are likely either to solve the problem or start sleeping longer” (54).
Late in the book Grudin begins a tirade against the inefficient and inconsistent ways we have of noting time’s passage: units composed of 60 seconds, 60 minutes, 24 hours, 7 days, 28, 29, 30 or 31 days, 12 months, 365 or 366 days. He provides a more rational approach in a time scheme that is partly decimal, and he reveals that he has structured this book on the calendar developed after the French Revolution by the Republicans, with twelve chapters and 30 numbered “daily” sections in each of these “months.” The effect is slighlty embarrassing, as if a traveler with whom one was sharing a train compartment revealed the details of his obsessive-compulsive disorder part way through the trip.
Grudin recommends keeping a journal in the last section of the book entitled “Memory,” and his advice is “use convenient physical media, keep them handy, and give yourself time to write” (180), but, most important, record the detail; the emotional reaction (“we had a wonderful time”) is not helpful to your later self in recreating the moment.… (més)

When Professor Adam Snell disappears from his office at University of Washagon, and then most copies of his somewhat controversial and already rare novel start to disappear, the police find him almost dead. Book is the story of his recovery, search for the killer (who is revealed to the audience early in the book) and the burgeoning commercial success of the book upon republication.

Admittedly, I am probably not this novel's target audience. I found it a bit dated, lacking in tension for most of the book and an amateurish satire of the field of post-modern literary theory. While I can appreciate the absurdity of academia, I found the book a bit tiresome and not much in the story to recommend it.… (més)