Customer Reviews

Here Kitty Kitty: A Novel

5 star:		(16)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

This is a truly absorbing debut, in equal parts potent and bewitching. Libaire reads the filigree of New York City like someone who has intimately traced its edges and mapped each inviting curl.

The best parts of the book, though, are maybe the more quiet episodes: the pure and clinging elegance of Libaire's prose comes out when she's writing about wet fields, cats, and wildflowers. The tremolo of the city relaxes into small private moments; summer is languid and heady, glimmering with wine and fireflies.

I can't say enough about this author's talent. Libaire writes with a plangent, poignant thunder that would stun but for the subtle dexterity of her voice. This is a book to be read and then reread, held close.

Lee is an edgy artistic Cinderella presented in a series of images portraying various facets of her sensory existence. Like a visually satisfying movie, her life plays out in contrasts with pure moonlit swims in seas of memory. By page one I had laughed and cried. By page seven I loved Lee in all her vulnerability, so innocent at heart, yet so famililar with the urban life.

Jardine Libaire's descriptive writing shows striking powers of observation beyond the normal recognition of life's complexity. Vertical pieces of thought paint in slivers as the story evolves like a montage of memories. The vibrancy of the portrait forming is cast in shades of lighting only an artist's sensibility could master.

"Then he'd gotten the makings of Mexican hot chocolate at a deli. He managed to use three pots, a couple knives, and a few spoons. Left chocolate shavings on the counter, cinnamon and burned milk on the stove. The sun had vanished, and he cooked in the dark. The only light was the violet blossom of gas flame." ~pg. 167

Stream-of-consciousness writing unravels Lee in her beauty and rite of passage through emotional complexity. She is loveable and running from herself into pleasures. Lost in sensuality and moments, she evolves and awakens, captured in silky prose. Memories of Lee's mother are nostalgic in beauty and contrast with the life Lee throws herself into with abandon.

Jardine Libaire's seductive writing style slips you into a calm solitude where splashes of images layer the story's canvas.

~The Rebecca Review

I picked this book up after hearing about it from many of my friends and I was definitely not disappointed. I was intrigued by Lee's character and her inability to make the correct decisions for herself - reminds me of many of my NYC friends. In addition, the prose is absolutely beautiful, especially for a chic lit novel.

If you are looking for some typical "fluffy" romance dribble, look elsewhere. This novel takes the reader through both the grimey muck and the sunny joys of life and love in the city. At some points you want to smack the main character (Lee), other times you feel genuine sympathy, and at other moments you want to go party with her; quite a rollercoaster of a read.
While it is no Tao-te Ching, the author provides plenty of depth in character development and vivid imagery; a quick, poetic read. Well worth the $, I'd say.

Lee sparkles (and fizzles) and reminds you that you will never be half as interesting or dynamic as she is-like those beautiful girls you knew in high school, who inhabit your classes but not your world. When Lee falls and learns how to live on her own, she does it with such New York panache, you are almost jealous of her small, grimy apartment, her empty wallet, and her detoxification. Author Jardine Libaire made the wise choice to keep Lee's story small. Lee is self-centered even during her recovery, and a larger story would have betrayed the narcissism that makes you love and hate her. And, after all, the choice to live your life sharply is only ever the day to day business of recognizing your small world. I didn't need Lee to be influenced by the love of a mysterious man, nevertheless, I understood the author's choice. Jardine Libaire's prose is so lyrical, it's practically poetry. The book is a love letter to New York, its landscape, its debauchery, and its insufferable and beautiful people.

As I read Libaire's first novel "Here Kitty Kitty" I found myself consumed and intoxicated by the beauty of words once again. The author also invited me to explore a deeper understanding of individual fulfillment by introducing me to "Lee's" complex and challenging world in New York City. As the book intensified, I found myself deeply moved by the character's actions and since putting the book down, a piece of Lee still remains with me. With its intelligent writing and hypnotizing story, "Here Kitty Kitty" is truly a book to read and reread over and over again.

This book is essentially the metaphorical musings of a jaded, self-destructive, failed-artist, sensitive grrrrl with Bettie Page bangs and a closetful of vintage dresses who hangs out with her fellow cool kids in the hipster haunt of Williamsburg while whining about her loser job, messed-up relationships, childhood "issues", and lost dreams, while spiralling down into the coke-and-mirrors decadence of last night's party.

Like the typical oft-mocked hipster, Lee is highly narcissistic and fueled with addictive behaviors. She represents the struggling artists, designers, writers and musicians with pennies to their name (because of society and The Man), but rich in street cred and hip factor; thus deeming themselves the most culturally and intellectually superior.

Inso, Lee is not someone I could feel sympathy for nor identify with. For example: Amongst her daily self-centeredness and woe-is-me histrionics, Lee is penniless and about to get kicked out of her apartment; she obtains a large amount of money--and chooses to lavishly spend it on a limousine ride and expensive shoes (to quell her pain, can't you see her worse-than-Morrissey misery?) for a temporary high. This disgruntled, ungrateful, and indulgent attitude does not lend itself to liking the main character; in fact, I can't stand people like this.

So then, why did I keep reading? Libaire's style of writing is simply exquisite. Poetic, emotive, brilliantly metaphorical, and flush with prose; words and sentences so delicately composed they could qualify as a painting. They say a picture is worth a thousand words; somehow, the opposite of this adage is more befitting.

The ending of this book doesn't really result in major revelations or plot twist. It starts with dispair and ends with dispair. Some of you may wonder, If Lee's life is so f'ed up, why doesn't she pull herself up by the bootstraps and make her life better? That's NOT the point, people. Here, suffering is an art form in itself, and Lee is doing a fabulous job at it. Romanticizing poverty, depression, and laziness is part of the game here; and whoever does it best wins.

Lee lives the party girl's dream of New York life. She hangs at the hot spots with the cool crowds and scores the best drugs. She manages a Tribeca restaurant, then parties until dawn. She's got it all...even a sugar daddy.

But things aren't always as good as they appear from the outside. In reality, Lee is not truly happy.

She's self-destructive. She works hard but has nothing solid to show for it because she spends her money at thrift shops and on good times rather than on rent and bills.

She loves Yves, the older man who takes care of her but she knows she can never be the class act he deserves. And even all of his money can't make her more than content. The love of her life is her painting . . . something she has severely neglected of late. And for Lee, until she puts that back into its proper place on her list of priorities, nothing else will fall into place either but she's just too scared of failure. Failure in her art and failure in herself.

So, she works and she spends and she parties until maybe, just maybe, she'll find within herself the determination to one day take that step toward the real Lee.

Jardine Libaire's style of mixing beautiful prose with short, blunt thoughts is as much a poetic contrast as is the inner workings of her protagonist's confused mind. Here Kitty Kitty reads almost like a scrapbook of memories - a party here, a lovemaking session there, failed attempts to live an almost-forgotten dream in between.

Some descriptions come in bursts and some are more drawn out. But they all portray the pensive and even angst-ridden emotions that are at war with the free spirit persona Lee has donned.

This novel can easily be related to by any reader that can see past the obvious to the turmoil below the surface of themselves...a turmoil that many people feel and most deny as Lee did. Here Kitty Kitty serves as a sort of talisman that one can always dig back to the surface no matter how deep the hole.

I highly recommend this book, the language is stunning. I found myself re-reading lines to absorb them. Each line is a little sketch of life. This book explores loneliness, grief, joy, love the change of seasons in poetic detail. Read it and dwell on the details, you will be absorbed.

Lee is on the verge of a breakdown when we begin her story. She gets high every day, snorts cocaine at work every 20 minutes, takes ecstasy and sleeps with older men who, as appearances would have it, take care of her and buy her expensive gifts, trendy clothes, furs and shoes.
Her story discloses by her accounts of a lifetime of excess, heavy partying, sex, alcohol, and loneliness that lead her to her downfall - the beginning of the end.
Jardine Libair's debut has a poetic narrative with a unique rhythm that artistically paints with words, the landscapes of the character's mind.
I loved the tone of her story telling; it's raw, intense, and powerful, it renders you silent and still to process the details surrounded by solitude and loss.
A wonderful read, almost like a film which portrays profound depths and labyrinths of the mind of this young woman who never gets to grow up properly and is totally adrift with drugs, no friends who really care, and no money of her own that counts for much.
A riveting story of self destruction and redemption.