Thanks for reminding me, I've been meaning to read Newjack. Will add it to my library list right now…

DJ Fluff, maybe this one? I seriously hated the other two (although I preferred On Beauty to the Autograph Man) and am sad that reading them knocked Zadie Smith down from 'one of my favorite contemporary writers' to 'author of one of my favorite books whose other books really suck.'

I agree with you, all four times. I love love loved White Teeth, but was seriously disappointed by both The Autograph Man and On Beauty, although that was probably inevitable given my high expectations going into both. They just seemed very unoriginal and uninspired coming after White Teeth.

I want to look forward to this because I remember her stand up being funny, but the promos are so god-awful I'm not sure I can even bring myself to watch.

According to the NPR interview I heard, he got up to 275 pounds for quite a while.

I gave up too. Mostly because I was not enjoying it at all…

Tears
Did it seem to anyone else like there was an awful lot of crying in this episode? If you were watching with the sound off you'd think it was a show about receiving diagnoses of terminal illnesses or something. Even when they were praised they seemed to be sobbing uncontrollably.

Another thanks from me! This was great to see after reading the book and poring over all of the discussions here.

You really should. Both 'Man Push Cart' and 'Chop Shop' are wonderful films.

Yeah, I see what you're saying. It does feel like she dropped the ball a bit with some characters, perhaps a symptom of overreaching.

Have you (or anyone else here) read any of Dennis Cooper's novels? He certainly takes the gross-out shocking stuff to the extreme, but I still find his books to be valuable and interesting, particularly in that they force me to work very hard to uncover their redeeming qualities.

Arturo, sorry if it sounded like I was accusing you of attempting to psychoanalyze the characters, which wasn't my intention. I was just trying to point out the general dangers (literary analysis is Very Serious Business) of the admittedly entertaining exercise of speculating about why a character acts a certain way,…

It also presupposes that Oly is a real person with actual motivations and emotions. While speculating about a character's psychology can be an entertaining way to pass the time, I don't think it's very productive critically, as we're very quickly reduced to wild guessing and speculation. Perhaps this speaks to the…

This was one of my favorite passages in the book as well. If it wasn't a library book, I definitely would have underlined it!

Arturo, I totally agree, and think this is a very astute analysis. Although, it does make me wonder about the dangers of attempting to psychoanalyze fictional characters.

Agreed, that would be fantastic. I suspect it's too late for this round, but perhaps in the future?

Hey, I was born in 1986 (also read lots of Goosebumps) and was a Comp Lit major, you guys have no excuses!

Champion was a surly melancholic little boy long before he started cycling. Mme. Souza attempted to cheer him up with a number of diversions, hitting upon the bike only when she noticed a cycling photo cut out of the newspaper, and discovered the photo of his parents with a bicycle.

I am also partial to 'Old World Underground,' and would recommend checking that out.

Is the park at least 1,000 feet away? Because I really can't move again.