Chuck Klosterman

When my friend Lindsey recommended this book to me (okay, she pressed it on me and said I had to read it because I was one of the three people she knew who would actually get it), I was skeptical. First, anyone who is called "voice of his generation" usually strikes me as pretentious as hell (Bret Easton Ellis, anyone?). Secondly, the guy works for Spin and I always thought Spin was for people who weren't good enough to get jobs at Rolling Stone. And finally, in this book, he's going on a road trip to look at sites where musicians died-either by their own hand or otherwise-and he brought 600 CDs with him. At my best, I could never match this guy for musical passion-although his usual gig IS writing about music. Also, he's about 10 years younger than I am, so I really wasn't sure I wanted to hear about his lazy-ass slacker generation.

Fine. I was wrong. Every time I thought he was unbearably pretentious (all those CDs! The purpose of the trip! He loves KISS!) he wrote something that forced me rethink my position. His discussion about Kafka with the 19-year old waitress at Cracker Barrel is amazing-do we dream the way we dream because of books, movies and television? Have they changed our perspective? How would things be different if we didn't have television and how has it changed our perpective on time in our dreams? She may not have known who the Allman Brothers were, but she knew Kafkaesque better than he did. And there were parts that were not only insightful but laugh out loud funny-the differences between pot people and coke people (the pot people go to unpopular bars, drink Miller High Life and go home to get high about the time the coke people go out to their semi-gay dance bars and try to meet members of Interpol in hopes of getting better coke and doing it in better bathrooms). And just when I thought this book was entertaining and funny-it actually made me think about why people like to do coke, which is not something I've ever really cared about-his line that coke "makes you more popular but less likable" was on target. His depiction of "every conversation I've ever had every time I've ever gone to Los Angeles for any reason whatsoever" gave voice to why I really don't like LA and made me laugh as well. But what really made me think was the description of his relationships with the women in his life. Is he in love with them? Are they in love with him? Does his loving them make him less loveable to them? Can it get worse? I know complicated lives and his was complicated, even to me. And the part about how people fall in love with the idea of the person and after having conversations in our head with them that are in no way real so the person can't live up to what you want because they aren't that person really hit home.
He was really very insightful in many ways (don't miss the part about Christian movies and how they have a completely different perspective on life and how you may need to die to save your friends) and that surprised me-I don't know why, but it did.

So, I liked it. Go read it, it won't take long....