Indecision: A Novel [Hardcover]

Benjamin Kunkel (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 30, 2005

Benjamin Kunkel’s brilliantly comic debut novel concerns one of the central maladies of our time–a pathological indecision that turns abundance into an affliction and opportunity into a curse.

Dwight B. Wilmerding is only twenty-eight, but he’s having a midlife crisis. Of course, living a dissolute, dorm like existence in a tiny apartment and working in tech support at the pharmaceutical giant Pfizer are not especially conducive to wisdom.

And a few sessions of psychoanalysis conducted by his sister have distinctly failed to help with his biggest problem: a chronic inability to make up his mind.

Encouraged by one of his roommates to try an experimental pharmaceutical meant to banish indecision, Dwight jumps at the chance (not without some meditation on the hazards of jumping) and swallows the first fateful pill. And when all at once he is “pfired” from Pfizer and invited to a rendezvous in exotic Ecuador with the girl of his long-ago prep-school dreams, he finds himself on the brink of a new life.

The trouble–well, one of the troubles–is that Dwight can’t decide if the pills are working. Deep in the jungles of the Amazon, in the foreign country of a changed outlook, his would-be romantic escape becomes a hilarious journey into unbidden responsibility and unwelcome knowledge.

How to affirm happiness without living in constant denial of the ways of the world? How to commit, and to what? At once funny and poignant, gentle and outrageous, finely intelligent and proudly silly, Indecision rings with a voice of great energy and originality, while its deeper inquiries reflect the concerns and style of a generation.


"Here’s what Indecision gives you: sustained social and intellectual comedy, possibly the last but certainly the funniest Superfluous Man in modern literature, drive-by satire, plus detailed set-piece send-ups of Young Adult colgrads at work and play. The mockery is
humane. The tale of Dwight Wilmerding is told with style and care. And there’s a surprising ending. Benjamin Kunkel, welcome!"
–Norman Rush, author of Mating

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Dwight Wilmerding, the vacillating, down-market prepster protagonist of Kunkel's debut novel, gets fired from his low-level job at Pfizer and, with the lease running out on his hive-like Chambers Street boys-club apartment, lights out for Quito, Ecuador, where high school flame Natasha is holed up. Before this momentous undertaking, Dwight has been afflicted with chronic postcollegiate indecision, particularly in relationships: should he pursue a life with his quasi-girlfriend, Vaneetha? Start up again with Natasha? And what about his weird thing for his sister, Alice? As luck would have it, one of his roommates is a med student who turns Dwight on to Abulinix, an experimental new treatment for chronic indecision, which makes his South American jaunt very eventful indeed. A subtheme on the post-politicality of post-9/11 20-somethings gives the book some bite and surfaces most conspicuously in the form of Brigid, the Euroactivist who, along with the drug, brings Dwight clarity, and even hope. Annoying but accomplished, this entertaining book has screenplay written all over it, from the hot Dutch Natasha to the shambling cute Dwight—not to mention Harvard-educated, New York– literati Kunkel himself. (Sept. 6)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From The New Yorker

Twenty years ago, Don DeLillo, in "White Noise," created a character so beset by morbid anxiety that she begins taking pills that obliterate the fear of death. In our era of precision-targeted psychotropics, this scenario no longer shocks; it's drearily plausible. For similar reasons, the satirical springboard of Kunkel's first novel—a neurotically aimless New Yorker takes medication that he believes will instill in him the ability to make commitments—is rather creaky. Moreover, the Big Pharma plot only partially masks the fact that this is yet another novel in which a charming, Nick Hornby-style layabout is mechanically cajoled into semi-maturity. Kunkel's narrator has an appealingly rascally voice, and the author is expert at depicting highbrow buffoonery—at an all-night Ecstasy party, flesh and philosophy commingle to hilarious effect—but the book, for all its crisp prose, can't escape the staleness of its conceit.
Copyright © 2005 The New Yorker

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 256 pages
• Publisher: Random House; First Edition edition (August 30, 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1400063450
• ISBN-13: 978-1400063451
• Product Dimensions: 9 x 6.2 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 2.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (56 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,276,332 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

57 of 69 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars very disappointing book, October 3, 2005

By 

Richard Kurtz (NYC<P>NYC, NY United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Indecision: A Novel (Hardcover)

I have to say, as I often say, that I agree with many of the reviews that have been posted here. I approached this book with great anticipation -- very good reviews, potentially interesting story line but, aas it turned out, I was really disappointed and borderline annoyed that this book had received the hype that it did. I was about 2/3 's of the way through and struggling to finish it and mentioned it to a friend of mine who is a published author, whose opinions I respect ,and asked him about this book and he said "he just gave up" about 1/2 way through --however, I did persist and with some judicious scanning did finish it. I did, however, like the beginning, thought it was funny and clever and really enjoyed Kunkel's capturing of some of the "voices" in a very humourouis way, (e.g. his father and mother) but once he goes off to Ecuador the book really sinks and goes absolutely nowhere as far as I am concerned. But, as they say, you don't know what something tastes like unless you try it ...and this one just didn't do it for me.

31 of 36 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Patchy, but entertaining at times, September 20, 2005

By 

Edmund Mcguigan "Ed McGuigan" (Boynton Beach, FL United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Indecision: A Novel (Hardcover)

I was struck by how wildly the reactions to this book vary. The women seemed to like it more than the men. I don't regret reading it but could not recommend it to others. I used to live in Quito and so had my interest piqued by the setting. I think I might have been less pleased by the book without this association.

On occasions Kunkel is funny, on others he is off the mark and needed to be taken to task by an editor. I imagine that a writer may have an approach where he gets "stuff" on the page that needs to be ferociously edited and honed, either by the writer alone or in conjunction with an editor. This didn't happen with Indecision.

There are some genuinely thought provoking musings but there is also a bit too much musing of lesser quality. Since a lot of the prose was the random inner musings of the main character, I think Kunkel felt entitled to leave them "in the rough". I would have preferred more cut and polish. I thought that the writer totally failed to give life to the Brigid character and the latter part of the book lacked believability.

He falls into "democratic socialism" in a way that does not jive with his subsequent commitment to the cause. I have often marvelled at how the mainstream media covers the anti-globalization protests of major economic summits without ever allowing the views of the protesters to be heard, leaving one to believe that they are simply a contrary rabble with no clear idea of what they are against. It was disappointing that Kunkel failed to properly develop some kind of expression of this anti-globalization / anti-neo-liberal viewpoint.

He is a young man and I hope he goes on to produce better quality work.

19 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Mixed feelings, September 26, 2005

By 

C. Yu - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Indecision: A Novel (Hardcover)

The first 50 pages of Indecision were like brain candy. Specifically, they were like Pop Rocks for my late twenty-something post-ironic soul - a lot of fizzle and the promise of danger, and also some drooling. Every other line in the first quarter of this book made me want to throw it across the room in a fit of envy/admiration. So clever! So right on the money! Aargh, I wish I had thought of this first!

The middle 100 or so pages, however, were different. I started to pick up a rhythm of beats and scenes and sequences, faint at first and then undeniable. The density of good lines decreased sharply and by the time I was about 2/3 of the way through I realized I was reading an extended screenplay/treatment.

The epilogue is really inexplicable. It feels a little Frankensteinish, like some grotesque body part grafted onto the wrong novel. It was as if Mr. Kunkel wanted Dwight to arc from Point A to Point B, realized ten pages from the end that he had not gotten the character anywhere near where he needed to be, emotionally, intellectually or even just geographically in the story, and basically just drew a straight line to the end, as in, voila, here we are.

I think a lot of the negative reviews on here may have been brought on as a result of backlash at the crazy amounts of attention Mr. Kunkel has received, especially from the New York Times. I think he absolutely deserves it - the attention, not the backlash. But I do think this book, for whatever reasons (hopefully not including a rush to completion driven by a justifiably excited publisher) falls way short of the promise it exhibits in the opening chapters.

Still, I know I'm buying his next book no matter what, so I guess that says a lot right there. I guess I was just expecting so much from Jay McInerney's review (that'll teach me) that even an above average reading experience was a severe letdown.