Customer Reviews

Monkey Girl: Swingin' Tales

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This book is great - I got it after reading her new one This Too Can Be Yours. Filled with short sharp stories about you-name-it everything (friends, parents, roommates, relationships, etc.), I've never read a writer who seems to put our current society in a nutshell so well. Lisick reduces fictional characters to archetypes (everyone in this book seems so familiar...) and turns ordinary scenarios into hilarious situations. I love books that make me laugh and this one certainly did!

Now, I've loved Anaïs Nin's work, but when Beth asks what makes Anaïs a legend and not "just a slut with a diary," we all know what she means. This the funky world of urban life for people of the twenty-something turning thirty-somethings set. This is what it's like to go into a bar and have some weirdo ask you ridiculous questions or claim to be your soul-mate over kamikazes. These pieces have big hi-fi volume running around on little PAC-MAN feet, always teetering on some amazing precipice of sanity. But then there are these moments that hurt they're so beautiful. Read "Empress of Sighs" and just see if the last few lines don't make you want to call your recenlty-moved or recently-retired or recently-menopaused mother and make sure she's okay. Or maybe look in the mirror and start counting backward your own self. There is a lot of humor in this book and you will undoubtedly laugh out loud while reading it. But there is an underlying social commentary thing going on that is somehow, at once, both subtle and fire-starting, sizzling greasy bacon. And my my, if you ever get an opportunity to see Lisick perform, go go go! Kudos to Lisick on such a marvelous book.

From "Crappy Brown Carpeting" to "The Answer Is Plastic," every single chapter is a classic tale of America in the nineties. Lisick is a new kind of writer, an original. You must have this book! She expresses herself with a pleasant sense of humor, understanding, and the perfect touch of criticism! This fresh new style of writing and poetry will definitely put a smile on your face

The book still isn't released just yet, but I saw Beth Lisick perform with 10BassT in San Jose this evening. She rocked the house with her stream-of-conciousness poetry. There are poets that can Write, and poets that can Deliver. She does both - well enough to bring a raucous hip-hop crowd to rap attention. Her images of Mr-the-one-with-the-most-toys and the Rat Boy blew up the sub-urban stereotypes into life size toxic reality. -bob mackey

Having grown up in the Bay Area at the same time, I found this book to be an accurate description of the trials and tribulations of a single girl in the 80's and 90's. Every chapter will put a smile on your face, especially mine, when I realized two old friends were referenced in one of the stories.

My first Beth Lisick book but it won't be my last. She's a good writer and if you ever get the chance to see her perform, don't miss it.

I was really hoping Beth would give some fresh perspectives on various boring recurrences and inarticulate people in America, but she herself is pretty boring and inarticulate. I find Michelle Tea to handle similar themes much, much better.

A game my friends and I often play is reminescing about our best meals-- no one has ever suddenly said, McDonalds last wednesday, the best big mac in the world! Beth Lisick's work is sadly like this. At first I was hungry for some humour so was highly impressed, but after the first reading nothing stayed with me. I saw her read and she was quite entertaining, a strong perfomer, but even then the poems still felt ... trivial. This book is, sadly, literary fast food.