Customer Reviews

Postcards from a Dead Girl: A Novel (P.S.)

5 star:		(18)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This excerpt is snappy, in the best sense of the word. Both the descriptive writing and the dialogue... and, flat out funny. Plus, readable, intriguing, and unique. Somewhat: priceless. For instance: the relationship between Sid and his dog. And Sid and Gerald, the post office guy. And Sid and the neighbor woman attached to the mailbox. And Sid's attempts to describe his love for Zoe. It's all good. It's all really good. I wish I wrote it. And I could find a sixth star!

edit added after initial review: just noticed another reviewer used the word snappy! See what I'm saying here...

Sid is falling to pieces, trapped in a job that patently fails to fulfil him, relying on his dog Zero to translate the world for him, and haunted by Zoe, a dead girlfriend who won't stop sending him postcards. This excerpt zips along, fast-paced and appealing. We're on Sid's side as he worries about his health, seeks reassurance from Gerald the Post Office guy, loses himself in memories of elaborate protestations of love for Zoe. Kirk Farber's writing is assured and zingy, and left me wanting more.

"This is Sid from Wanderlust, calling you with another exciting offer." When most of us hear these words through our telephone handsets, we're considering the most expeditious way of extricating ourselves--or cursing ourselves for not reading Caller ID before we picked up. Definitely an antihero setup.

Bonding with Sid is somewhat rough. Having him legitimately receive postcards from a deceased ex-girlfriend is pretty unsettling and is definitely an aspect that arouses reader compassion and curiosity. However, the traditional method of reading inside the point of view character's 'headspace' can result in dizziness and disorientation. Yes--the sensory detail is that good.

"Postcards" comes packed in nine short chapters, which seem more like cameos than scenes. Writing 'hooks' at the end of the chapters could keep us a bit more on the edge. This is standard mystery genre practice and could be easily done.

Sensory information is good in a lot of this excerpt. There may be too much during some of Sid's episodes--and this is one rare instance where the balance of showing versus telling might help the reader stay better focused instead of drifting off with Sid.

Is Sid mentally ill, does he have an actual illness, or is he a hypochondriac? Trust a person with potential hypochondriasis to 'want a new drug' in his lover, e.g. if Sid owned a pharmaceutical company, he'd bottle his feelings for Zoe in a turquoise pill and call it "Blue Zoe Bliss." Other symptoms point to mental illness-or as Sid's physician sister points out, brain problems.

"Postcards" is a very interesting premise and a well-done venture into comic surreality. Good luck to Kirk Farber!

[Note: My review also appears under the Editorial Reviews]

This quirky, potentially surreal, "tragicomic" story seems to be a real winner. I love what I've read so far - and to know just how impressive a statement I just made, you need to know that the main character is a telemarketer (not exactly my favorite kind of person). Poor Sid Higgins is almost as screwed up as I am. The postcard thing is really starting to freak him out. While he can appreciate the "Wish you were here" sentiment each card expresses, he doesn't understand why they keep coming, especially since he's pretty sure the sender is dead. Every day he gets another postcard from a different part of the world, always signed by his girlfriend Zoe, and always postmarked a year ago. The guy down at the local post office can't really explain it, either.

The daily receipt of postcards from a dead girl isn't Sid's only problem, though. His boss is driving him crazy with false promises and excessively enthusiastic words of encouragement even as his job performance continues to slide, and his unusual reaction to each postcard he receives (which usually involves a sense of unreality brought about by a temporarily strong and unexplainable smell of lilac) has him wondering if he might have a brain tumor. Much more worrisome, however, is his increasing tendency to depend on his dog, Zero, to translate other people's words for him. All that translating is starting to get on Zero's nerves, too, just to tell you the truth.

There's really only one thing to do, when you come right down to it. Sid has to embark on a great journey of discovery, attempting to trace the origins of all these postcards and hopefully find his way to the mysterious force behind them. I wouldn't dare to even guess at what he will find out, or how this story will play out in the end, but I want to be there to see it happen. From what I've seen so far, Postcards From a Dead Girl is a wickedly funny and original story.

In Kirk Farber's Postcards From A Dead Girl, we are introduced to hypochondriac Sid Higgins who is compelled to track down the origins of postcards sent from his dead(?) girlfriend Zoe. In the few pages posted here, Farber proves himself to be a deft stylist with a knack for hooking readers. Is Sid really sick or is all the death around him (his parents, possibly Zoe) forcing him to acknowledge his own mortality. Sid's dreary job is selling vacation packages over the phone, while Zoe's postcards come from similarly exotic locales. Farber reveals a character isolated from the world's beauty and warmth, yet still teased and tempted by it. Will his quest to find the origin of the postcards reunite him with his lost love? I hope we get the chance to find out. Highly recommended.

This excerpt has an intriguing premise: a (possible) hypochondriac selling Wanderlust vacations receives postcards from his (possibly) dead girlfriend. With a nod toward absurdist comic writers such as Max Barry, Farber throws the reader immediately into the off-kilter world of Sid and his lavender-scented seizures.

While Farber creates some memorable scenes -- mostly notably the flashback where Sid tries to express his love for Zoe as she spouts pseudo-Mandarin, this opening suffers from narrative jumpiness. Farber gets the momentum started, only to derail it a paragraph later with a new scene supplying background or an entirely different situation. The problem is not as much the vignette quality of the scenes but the deflation of a conflict just beginning to be established. If Farber had held off on some of his background/flashbacks (but not the Zoe one!) until later in the book when the reader had already come to care about his characters, then perhaps this excerpt would have earned five stars from me.

Although the organization of the excerpt could have been more compelling, Farber has proven that he belongs in this group of semi-finalists.

Sid is obsessed with his ex-girlfriend, Zoe who is sending him postcards from Europe. The only problem is that they are postmarked from a year ago, and nobody has heard or seen Zoe in all that time. Is Sid going crazy? This is what POSTCARDS FROM A DEAD GIRL by Kirk Farber makes us wonder. And it doesn't help that Sid's sister Natalie thinks he just may be. Farber's novel is delightfully written with enough humor to not make it sappy and or depressing.

This man's writing is sterling silver. Polished. Gleaming. Rare patina. He doesn't waste a word -- they are all precise and beautiful -- and yet there is depth. I read the postcards with Sid and find myself hoping for the ridiculous, that they are real, that they are written in the swirly hand of his beloved Zoe. Maybe she really is in Rome. I'll have to read the rest of this to find out.

I loved this - Farber's style is engaging and immediate. In this excerpt he sets forth his mystery and introduces us to Sid, the young man obsessed by it. Sid is like a trusted friend who tells you he's got a dilemma, and it's pretty farfetched. You're not sure you believe him, but darn it, he's your friend, so you give him the benefit of the doubt, plug in your loyalty and set out to help him figure out what the heck's going on here.
Farber's Sid is a contemporary phenomenon - not necessarily a guy my mom would have known. He's intelligent, sensitive, and stripped of the masculine ability of a bygone era that allowed a guy to simply pretend everything was fine. The only problem is he hasn't yet been given a new set of tools with which to deal with grief. Instead he smells lilacs, imagines fatal maladies, and cries over a ridiculous television show. Grief has affected all his senses, even his hearing, and it seems that only his patient dog, Zero, is on his wavelength and able to translate the chatter around him. Sid has me the moment his throat starts to burn. He's upset, and who can blame him? If I were getting postcards from my dead girlfriend, I'd be upset too. Befuddled and forced by grief into a sort of humorous hypochondria, Sid is exposed and vulnerable, and he knows it. Death is one of those things no one is ever prepared for, so in a way, Syd's doing alright.
Logically, Sid sets off for the post office hoping to get an answer from the authorities. I'm rooting for him, and counting on the postman, that old fashioned figure of authority, is going to help. I want to find out where those postcards are coming from as much as he does. But I know Sid's not going to get his answer, not yet. I want to see what he'll do next, maybe go along and protect him on his journey, but only because I know it's going to be humorous and fascinating.
Sid is a man I definitely know - heck, Sid's a man I am. Farber puts into words a state we've all been in, and he does it in a way that makes think we knew it all along. I would trust Farber's ability to engross me in a plane full of crying babies. This book is going to be published, and when it is, I'm going to buy it.

Kirk Farber's story Postcards from a Dead Girl is beautifully written with quirky humor in a flowing, stream-of-consciousness style. He has done a masterful job of hinting at Sid's emotional upheaval, maybe rooted in Zoe's death, or maybe in something older and deeper.

There doesn't seem to be a single misstep in this excerpt; it's a delight to read. I was sorry when it ended. I'll be watching for this on the bookshelf.