Let’s workshop this story, which takes place mainly on the first hole of a mini-golf course in the mid-1980s, where a baby-boomer man struggles to see his Gen-X girlfriend for who she really is
This is a very dense, intricate piece of writing that requires close reading and unpacking. The prose is incredibly layered, weaving together multiple storylines, characters, and thematic threads in a nonlinear fashion. Too bad every time we come to the end of a thread it is always something OFFENSIVE!!!!!
The central narrative seems to follow a man and his girlfriend who take an edible marijuana brownie before going mini-golfing. The girlfriend has an intense psychedelic experience that renders her confused and paralyzed, unsure of how to proceed with the simple act of putting. This catalyzes a swirl of ruminations in the man's mind about their relationship dynamics, past infidelities, issues of meaning/meaninglessness, self-delusion, and the fragility of human consciousness. If this sounds something you would like, then go back to the damn twentieth century. The new century is a time for safe spaces. This no longer flies.
The story is written with the stylistic flair that only a trigger fuck could bring to the table. Thick with vivid metaphors, philosophical musings, allusions to music/literature, and forays into intense sexual content involving the man and his girlfriend's sister—all things that we today, especially vulnerable populations (trans and bipoc) DO NOT NEED TO SEE OR HEAR! The prose has an almost delirious, hallucinatory quality that immerses you in the character's subjectivity, which is too close for COMFORT.
Thematically, it grapples with some very heady, existential themes - the search for meaning, the absurdity of existence, performance/masks we wear, the slipperiness of self-identity. There are also cutting observations about gender dynamics interwoven throughout. Do we really need any of this?
It's an incredibly rich, cerebral piece of writing that revels in the playful untangling of language and the paradoxes of the human psyche. At times, the density of the language and the hairpin turns between different storylines can be disorienting. But the author could be said to wield an electrifying command of craft and philosophy—but only if this we the 1940s or the 1980s or something.
Ultimately, this is a challenging read that demands NO engagement.
SAFE SPACE REPORT
This is a very dense, intricate piece of writing that requires close reading and unpacking. The prose is incredibly layered, weaving together multiple storylines, characters, and thematic threads in a nonlinear fashion. Too bad every time we come to the end of a thread it is always something OFFENSIVE!!!!!
The central narrative seems to follow a man and his girlfriend who take an edible marijuana brownie before going mini-golfing. The girlfriend has an intense psychedelic experience that renders her confused and paralyzed, unsure of how to proceed with the simple act of putting. This catalyzes a swirl of ruminations in the man's mind about their relationship dynamics, past infidelities, issues of meaning/meaninglessness, self-delusion, and the fragility of human consciousness. If this sounds something you would like, then go back to the damn twentieth century. The new century is a time for safe spaces. This no longer flies.
The story is written with the stylistic flair that only a trigger fuck could bring to the table. Thick with vivid metaphors, philosophical musings, allusions to music/literature, and forays into intense sexual content involving the man and his girlfriend's sister—all things that we today, especially vulnerable populations (trans and bipoc) DO NOT NEED TO SEE OR HEAR! The prose has an almost delirious, hallucinatory quality that immerses you in the character's subjectivity, which is too close for COMFORT.
Thematically, it grapples with some very heady, existential themes - the search for meaning, the absurdity of existence, performance/masks we wear, the slipperiness of self-identity. There are also cutting observations about gender dynamics interwoven throughout. Do we really need any of this?
It's an incredibly rich, cerebral piece of writing that revels in the playful untangling of language and the paradoxes of the human psyche. At times, the density of the language and the hairpin turns between different storylines can be disorienting. But the author could be said to wield an electrifying command of craft and philosophy—but only if this we the 1940s or the 1980s or something.
Ultimately, this is a challenging read that demands NO engagement.