Toxic Masculinity

With recent films like Goat, and Moonlight, and so much pre-election discussion of the real world dangers of toxic masculinity, I felt sure that now was the right time for my debut novel, Chinese Gucci. It seemed we were finally on the verge of a meaningful cultural examination.

Post-election, though...not so much.

After the election, I stopped submitting queries to agents, and seriously considered shelving the project indefinitely. It seemed that the mindsets the book set out to indict (toxic masculinity, flippant racism, sexism, white privilege) had not only re-emerged but were once again running rampant. America's history is stained by exactly these same mindsets -- a fact that deeply compromises our nation's otherwise glorious aspiration (however imperfect) of democracy and greater equality.

In short, I didn't feel like fighting.

Hell, it didn't feel like it was a fight that, as a species, we were actually interested in winning. Humans, I think, don't actually care about the "pursuit of happiness," or "liberty, and justice for all." No, no...most just want "happiness" and "liberty" and "justice" for themselves...and maybe a few other folks they know.

And that's dogshit.

I foolishly expect better of us. So, like it or not, feel up to it or not, we have to fight. Not eventually...we have to do it now. And however that fight looks for you, embrace it, do it, push yourself beyond your comfort zone, and help out...do your part. Lock arms with those who share your vision, and stand up for the world you foolishly believe might one day exist.

To that end, I sent out another query last night. I'll keep pushing on Chinese Gucci, and everything else -- hoping to offer up something new for you all to read in 2017 and beyond.

Okay.
 

P.S. -- For anyone interested, here's something of a sneak-peek at the kind of kid Akira (the character at the center of the novel) is. Or at least who he pretends to be...

Turns Out We're All Unreliable, Unlikable Narrators...

A confession: I am not an objective voice in this.

My novel, Chinese Gucci, has an insufferable little shit at the center of it, and I think books that use this approach allow for a terrifically dissonant reading experience. You gut-laugh and guffaw, you scoff and scorn...spit-take, if things are working really well. You, as the person reading, look at the character and think, "what the hell are they thinking?!" And yet, like a trainwreck, you don’t want to take your eyes off the page for fear of what you’ll miss. That, to me, is a kind of narrative wizardry: part Schadenfreude; part empathy; part judgment – all from a safe remove. It allows writers to plumb the deepest recesses of the human animal, to skewer cultural norms, and as readers, allows us to live other, possibly dangerous realities without suffering the actual consequences. Which means that stories accomplish their most basic goal: connecting disparate people through shared experience.

There are, however, readers out there who conflate their feelings about a book’s characters with the overall worth of a book, take the narrator as a surrogate for the book’s writer. And, as a way to read, and as a measure of a book's objective quality, that's a problem.

There are PLENTY of GOOD ARTICLES written by folks wiser than me addressing UNLIKABLE CHARACTERS including those many female leads of many recent novels-turned-blockbusters. I encourage you to read the articles.

But it does make me worry, a bit, about our culture at large – the blurring of the line between creator and art. Maybe it's because we’re fairly self-involved, Narcissistic even...because there’s the "selfie generation," or the redemptive/destructive power of social media, and everyone's highly curated digital faces – all carefully scrubbed of obvious flaws and insecurities. Maybe we prefer simplicity...prefer taking things only at face value. Maybe it's because we're all unreliable narrators but don't want to admit it. Ah, but do we want to manufacture a world so perfect that we never see any discomfort, any disagreement, and experience only things that reaffirm our current façades and prejudices?

Or is there still value in willingly subjecting ourselves to the snow-blind blizzards of complexity, uncomfortablity, and imperfection for the many unexpected virtues they will teach us?

Anyway, I think so. Maybe it’s because Banned Books Week 2016 is ending, or because ten years ago, they closed CBGB – where THIS was said. Culturally, it’s hard to say if things have improved in the decade since. Anyhow, go read it, re-read it – take it in. Our cultural vibrancy hangs on these very freedoms and ideas.

Embrace complexity.

Defend what offends you as a stop-gap for our own lazy thinking.

Then go make something beautifully weird.

Chinese Gucci and the Case for Reading Intentionally

File Under: Debating

Here's a decent ONE - TWO punch from The Guardian about why it's important to KEEP BOOKS DANGEROUS. Both articles are talking about Young Adult books, but I say it applies equally to literary fiction. I can't say I agree with the first article’s assertion that books shouldn't be “gratuitous or explicit” — as I think there is value in grit. So long as a reader can be shocked, I think they should be. Not simply for shock’s sake but because at worst it jars the mind of a lazy reader, and at best encourages a deeper internal conversation about the book and the nature of what’s shocking, and why. But the bulk of both articles agreed with me.

It's adorable to think that as long as we work tirelessly enough, we can “protect the children” from the unsavory world and its R-rated (or X-rated) ideas — that nothing will come along and undo it all in a blink. Adorable and unrealistic. I fear more the moment something does happen, and the painful realization that we’ve left them wholly unprepared for the complexity. If given the choice, I'll always take the physically and emotionally safe realm of a book, indeed of knowledge, of imagination, and the world of mind — over the actual danger of schoolyards and streets.

These questions are of tremendous interest to me in the middle of rewriting the first novel, Chinese Gucci, and have heartened me about some of my instincts and decisions. I believe very much in a visceral connection (even if it’s repulsion) with a book, believe that good books and good characters “contain multitudes.” The book is a hopefully clever indictment of a certain brand of adolescent hyper-masculinity, and as such, it has some pretty unpalatable stuff in it. Add to it the largely untested ideas about race and success that many young people start off with, and there are plenty of hot-button issues in the book that may well end up scaring off some readers and distracting from the book's larger intent.

And that's a terrifying concern.

It seems, in our race to never offend, never belittle or shame, never visit microaggressions upon another, we've become hyper-aware to the point of near mental inaction. By that I mean we've lost the ability to accurately parse intent from the larger mash-up of content. Someone says something that, on it's face, seems offensive — okay, yes, offensive ideas should offend. Ah, but why did they say it? Did I even hear it correctly? Did they accidentally tank what they meant to say instead? Is there another way to take it? Are we even talking about the same damn thing? This feels like something we are rapidly becoming either unwilling or unable to do any more. It’s much easier to simply fly off the handle, and launch into our own screeds and tirades. That feels perilous. Ideas, words, world views, differences — these can and should be evaluated — not just on their face, but through the lens of intent. If we lose that, why even bother with language?

So what do you think? What’s worse: a dangerous book, or a painfully safe one? An offensive book or an inoffensive one? Should anything ever be off limits for readers? For writers?