4.5 out of 5 stars
The irony of liking this book is that it is about people liking books that are not actually good books. Or placing something into a specific category thinking it speaks for everyone in that category. The idea that a novel written in what is supposed to be I assume be AAVE speaks for all African Americans is hilarious. That is why this book works though. Everett keeps you inside Monk’s head the whole time as he navigates his dying family and his failing writing career. This constant internal monologuing by Monk allows you to feel his frustration and embarrassment about writing this book and it taking off.
The other thing that is done well is the snobbishness that Monk feels about literature and how it is, at least in his eyes, ART. This is true but as an avid reader of books I think some books are good that no one would consider art. Yet as all art is subjective this is a hard thing to quantify. His hatred of the other book, We’s Lives in Da Ghetto, causes him to spurn a potential lover as well as write his piece of garbage book, My Pafology later renamed Fuck.
Everett also does a great job of actually writing a great novel about life as an African American in America. well educated black man is unsuccessful in the world of the white man until he belittles himself and portrays himself as the ex-con thug who can’t really write. As he travels through the book he encounters more and more white people who praise his creation as well as the aforementioned We’s Lives in Da Ghetto. Yet, he does not portray all black characters as upper class educated ivy leaguers. In fact when he arrives at a tv studio to do an interview the only person that does not praise his book is the lowly black assistant.
Try as you might though this is not a story that is uplifting or powerful it is a story of one man struggling to find a place in the world, in his family, and his career. He is desperate to be loved by his dead father. He wants his siblings to entertain the idea of a relationship with him, something that becomes impossible as the book goes on. He is also struggling with an ailing mother who is quickly sliding into dementia and how he will take care of her.
It is funny how accurate this book is to what white people do to seem like they understand or care to understand. yet you present them with a black man who does not fit some mold and that suddenly confuses them. I think a perfect moment in this book is when it cuts away for just a half a page to a conversation between two movie producers. He thinks it is the kind of movie that every Black American wants to watch and that it will be seen as the work that makes everyone take him seriously. Because the delusion is that this is what Black Americans are. While we know, or should know, that this is not the case it is still prevalent in society. This idea that to be Black is to be Van Go Jenkins or one of his four babies with names base don medicine names like Aspireene and Rexall. The gushing praise given to My Pafolgy/Fuck leads to an ending that is abrupt but deserved.
I would give this a 5 out of 5 but I was actually not a fan of the 10 chapters of My Pafology/Fuck in the middle of the book. I think they are needed to stress the point of how bad it is and Everett does a fantastic job of it but I would have liked maybe half of what was in there. Although who am I to say it would have made the book better. I loved it and think I might read more by Everett in the future. He is a good writer and does absurd humor in a good way. I also plan on watching the movie, you have to love a Jeffrey Wright film.
The Fresh Persepctive 