Place Not Space

Crap, another book I have to read. Actually two–Triburbia and Life, A User’s Manual–plus maybe re-read Dubliners. If Odd Words is a Geo-Memoir, as I have styled it, then I guess I need to keep up with the literature of place. And because sleep is such a goddamn waste of time:

Karl Taro Greenfeld, reviewers have been quick to do two things: compare Triburbia to Joyce’s Dubliners and pound on you about how dislikeable your characters are. Whereas I can see the comparison to Dubliners—that is, geography is story, geography becomes narrative—I don’t think that’s the most apt comparison. You two aim at very different things, with very different points of both departure and arrival. If anything, I think Triburbia is a lot like Georges Perec’s Life, A User’s Manual—this is no small compliment—only more modest in scope. The irony being your book is geographically situated in an entire neighborhood, whereas Perec’s is a mere apartment building. Much like both you and Joyce, Perec’s building becomes its own character.
– From HTMLGiant

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