I guess I should start out by saying that this isn't the book that I read. My book has the sharpie graffiti in the form of fish surrounding the guy's head and then a cat face on the actual guy. This book has several various stickers that are slapped on the covers, all of the big guy seen here but with a slight, not-so-subtle change. Why? I guess so you'll know which one is yours at the book club.
So even the cover is gimmicky and while many of these stories are good, some are really good - it never really gets past its cuteness. They all seem like the beginnings of really great stories but end up with vague not-quite-conclusions. But since Heti's style is unmistakably polished ("Every plan fails. That's what the man had refused to tell him. Every single body's. But that, my friend, is precisely life's sorrow.") You can't deny that that there is something there.
Maybe I'm out of touch, out of practice with the modern short story. But at the end of the stories you aren't given hope about the state of fiction. It is easy to see why people stay with the classics, why people aren't sure why they should read anymore. The monotonous, intelligent, austere, polished prose doesn't lead the reader to new discoveries, instead it leaves him confused. I realize that, after reading this, that it sounds like I hate this book. Not true. I like it. I like the challenge. I would read more by Heti. It is a book that does not comfort. It does not provide conclusive, moral endings. In fact, the goals it often seems to deliberately confuse. But then you return to them, and you might possibly think: how curious, how interesting, how nervy. Maybe it's the same reason why I got tired of John Barth or never really began liking Donald Barthelme. Maybe it's a reaction to how things aren't nice and tidy anymore, that we aren't told - or aren't able to tell - what the morals or dreams or ideals should be passed on because it can't fit into a sound bite or short story.
