The Living End by Stanley Elkin
My rating: 4/5 cats
years ago, during the height of oprah’s book club reign of terror, greg proposed that i start my own club at our store, in which i would create a series of stickers to be put on books, larger and more offensive than oprah’s, showing my feelings about the book.
basically – a thumbs-up for books i loved
a thumbs-down for books i hated:
and something like this:
for “who knew i would like this book with such an awful cover and not-very-interesting premise even though both greg and tom have been telling me for years to read stanley elkin because i would like him and it turns out i do??”
it was a complicated system.
and, naturally, we never actually did anything towards this plan, but if we had, i am sure i could have toppled oprah off her couch. it was only a matter of time.
and it was only a matter of time before i finally read a stanley elkin novel. and i am so freaking glad i did. it is my understanding that this is one of his “lesser” works, and that’s fine. i think it is a good starting point – i got a sense of his humor, his language, the clarity of his vision, and his comedic irony. and i liked it. truthfully, i liked the first part best. i was hooked by the third paragraph, and i fell in love with ellerbee; a good man who always tries to do the right thing learns, after his untimely death, that god really does mean all that fine print. i thought it was perfect. the rest of the book was also good – a sort of riff on dante that goes to some extremes dante would not have touched with a barge pole, but my heart belongs to ellerbee.
and i vow to read at least two more elkin novels before the end of the year.*
you heard it here first.
watch your back, oprah.
*edit – i did not keep this vow. i am the worst.
