Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #102585 in Books
• Published on: 2004-12-02
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 256 pages

Review
'An intriguing and accomplished novel: funny, inventive, and ultimately cheering.' Washington Post; 'A droll, downbeat vision that is both original and persuasive.' Newsweek

Washington Post
an intriguing and accomplished novel: funny, inventive and ultimately cheering.

Customer Reviews

Only Flashes of Genius
I picked this up because I'd really enjoyed Lethem's "Gun With Occasional Music", "Motherless Brooklyn", and parts of "The Wall of the Sky, The Wall of the Eye". Unfortunately, this surrealist sci-fi road-trip never leads anywhere interesting. Chaos, the amnesiac hero, is on a quest to discover the truth of what what happened the world (we are given hints of alien attack, nuclear/biological holocaust, etc.) and his own identity. However, memory, time and truth seem to be totally subjective in this landscape and are somehow dictated and controlled by his dreams. The overwhelming subjectivity results in a surprisingly dull roadtrip, as he struggles to find himself in a world which makes no sense. As with some of Lethem's other work (especially his short stories), there are a some interesting ideas, flashes of genius writing, and the sense that Lethem doesn't know how to finish what he's started. Unless you're really into dreamlike surrealism, skip this one, 'cause Lethem's capable of much better.

The Putty Clock
I've been a great fan of Lethem since I picked up Gun, With Occasional Music while travelling to Amsterdam. His ability to mix genres and make the absurd seem normal offers a refreshing, unique (and in this case - metaphysical) reading experience.
This story starts of with Chaos, a man who chooses to live in a multiplex cinema in a mutant town after the bomb has dropped. He and others in the town pick up the dreams of Kellog, who one day reveals that the bomb never did drop......

Utterly mental brilliance
Firstly, to suggest this is a science fiction novel is to do it a disservice - I think that there are some echoes of Philip K. Dick, but this is more surrealism than sci-fi. It reminds me of the dream narratives of Leonora Carrington particularly. I think there's a little Kafka in there too.

The central themes are identity, reality and memory. As the tale progresses, the identity of the main character slips and slides as he tries to recover who he really is. Things are confused by the fractured nature of reality - you're left to wonder whether he's dreaming the whole thing, whether the dreams of others are mutating his reality - or whether the very nature of reality itself has broken down in some more 'real' sense. This is certainly a scenario in most Dick narratives - but I think Lethem handles it in a more sophisticated way.

I like this a lot - must go and seek out more of Lethem's work...