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Title: The Tetherballs of Bougainville : A Novel by Mark Leyner ISBN: 0-679-76349-X Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 01 September, 1998 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $12.00 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.4 (45 reviews)
Rating: 4
Summary: A bizarre gem of cynical psychedelia.
Comment: By all means, read "The Tetherballs of Bougainville" by Mark Leyner. It's cynical and spastic and hilarious. Leyner is like David Foster Wallace with his moral compass surgically removed and replaced with the complete works of Monty Python crossed with Thomas Pynchon if he were raised on MTV by rich Eurotrash in New Jersey. And he seems to be getting better; I've enjoyed each of his books more than the previous one, and this one is no exception. (Having read his first book after some of the more recent ones, I believe that it's not that I'm getting to know and/or like his style more, but that he's actually getting better.) This is a book of pyrotechnic linguistic ability, brilliant and incessant cultural references, stunning imagery (my favorite: Buddhist monks paginating toilet tissue, which is tossed off as part of a larger joke about interactive literature), and very little plot, although more than in his previous work. What plot there is is rife with internal inconsistencies, but they're so glaring as to be obviously intentional. (At least with Mark Leyner one can speak of internal inconsistencies so glaring as to be obviously intentional, as opposed to e.g. Philip K. Dick, whose work contains internal inconsistencies so glaring as to be obviously the result of the book having been written in a 48-hour amphetamine-fueled frenzy on deadline.) It is also a book of long, complicated sentences. I like that.
Rating: 4
Summary: Wackyness
Comment: The Tetherballs of Bogainville is an odd book. To say the least! It is a so-called "genre-buster" in that it is one of a new class of novels that strive to be completely unclassifiable. Tetherballs does this fairly successfully.
The protagonist of the novel is Mark, a thirteen-year-old highly precocious boy who strides around in leather pants and no shirt. The entire novel is told from his perspective and it seems to be one bizarre tangent after another! I can't even remember a fraction of them. The humor is sophisticated, but so absurdist that I have found myself breaking out into guffaws at many points!
But because of it's ridiculous nature, tangents, etc., it is sometimes a bit hard to read - you start getting numb to the roller coaster ride that Leyner puts you on. So I have had to limit my exposure and put the book aside for a few days after reading each chapter or two.
This book is not for the weak of stomach or the uptight. However, if you have a good sense of humor and like your humor dry yet absurd, with a ton of references thrown in from the historical to the scientific, and you don't mind mixing your reality with a good deal of fantasy, you will find Tetherballs a fascinating read!
Rating: 5
Summary: 2nd greatest book I've ever read, no...THE GREATEST
Comment: This is one of those books that if you get it, you love it, but if you don't get it you're in for 300 pages of extreme pain. You need some sort of touch on the pulse of pop culture for one thing and you need some sort of touch on the pulse of what it's like to be a young teenage male. With those two tools you are ready for the greatest ride in all of literature.
The jokes actually rarely fall flat, which is amazing considering there are like 25 on every page. The book is hysterical from start to finish, the ending of the book is absolutly perfect. And leyner definalty succeeded in making it seem like I was the main charector. Forget Holden Caufield, I was Mark Leyner.
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Title: Tooth Imprints On a Corn Dog by Mark Leyner ISBN: 0679745211 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 03 January, 1996 List Price(USD): $12.00 |
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Title: Et Tu, Babe by Mark Leyner ISBN: 0679745068 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 24 August, 1993 List Price(USD): $11.95 |
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Title: My Cousin, My Gastroenterologist : A novel by Mark Leyner ISBN: 0679745793 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 10 May, 1995 List Price(USD): $11.00 |
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Title: I Smell Esther Williams by Mark Leyner ISBN: 0679750452 Publisher: Vintage Pub. Date: 31 January, 1995 List Price(USD): $12.00 |
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Title: Choke by CHUCK PALAHNIUK ISBN: 0385720920 Publisher: Anchor Pub. Date: 11 June, 2002 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
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