Customer Reviews

The Room

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

 

 

Whenever you read something by Selby you have to wonder how sick and disgusting the human mind can get. Do not misunderstand me. I think Selby is brilliant and everyone should read his works when they are ready for it. But not until then. Indeed, with Room that hole into the soul of humanity is so deep that if you were in the last level of hell, you would still be looking down...a long, long way. This book has been the worst experience of my life. I would highly recommend it.

First off, let me say this book is not for the squeamish or easily offended. As anyone who has read Selby before knows, his writing is about as 'reality based' as you can get and he spares the reader nothing as he delves deep into the minds of the often-forgotten denizens of our society.

When I first started The Room, I thought it would be a kinder, gentler Selby, since there are few characters and only one setting. However, this is definitely one of his most searing novels, and parts of it make Last Exit To Brooklyn seem like almost family reading. Selby has an amazing ability to define his characters so well, that not only do you understand/see their madness, but you also see the human being that lies beneath the madness, the part that at one point in time had potential to live in our society, but circumstance and environment led them to the lower levels of society; the bums, criminals, prostitutes, etc. To ignore his writing is to also ignore the breakdown that is happening at the edges of society, and the suffering that the 'average' person has to endure in their lifetime.

Despite the heavy content, I was unable to put The Room down as I became more familiar with the main character and his true nature and situation slowly reveal themselves, like an evil thing lurking in the shadows with a pleasant smile (or something).

Any Selby fans who have not come across this book should order it right now! You will not be disappointed and this book was the follow-up to Last Exit To Brooklyn, so it was written during that period when Selby seemed to have an agenda. His more recent books (The Demon, The Willow Tree) just didn't do it for me like this one, Last Exit to Brookyln and Requiem for A Dream did. Very compelling reading.

If Last Exit to Brooklyn didn't disgust or make you cringe, this novel definitely will. As I stated in my "Last Exit..." review, "Last Exit..." has it's moments but is not nearly as brutal as "The Room". The main character in "The Room" is a convict and it is not very clear under what conditions he became incarcerated. The convict constantly fantasizes about some very sick scenarios in which pain is inflicted on others. The one scenario that is perhaps the worse is one involving the torture of dogs. Graphic details are given, so if you are a dog lover and or you really hate reading about any type of animal cruelty, avoid reading this book.

One has to ask the question after reading this book, what kind of person entertains such sick thoughts? The answer to that is the people are all around us. I don't think there is a person alive who hasn't once fantasized about some pretty sick things not unlike what the main character in this book has thought about when things didn't go our way. Interestingly, after reading this book I didn't have any sick fantasies for a while because I was so disgusted with some of the main character's thoughts. Catharsis isn't the only redeeming aspect of the book however. I think the book also makes very powerful statements about prison and being incarcerated.

On the one hand this book does a pretty good job delving into the tedium that a prisoner must experience and it does a pretty good job exploring in a realistic manner the fantasies in which a criminal pyschopathic personality might engage. But to tell the truth, I got bored with the book. Maybe that's one of the points--incarceration in not an exciting thing.

Basically, the main character, the prisoner, engages in two alternating fantasies. In the first, he dreams about using his intellect to blow the cover off of the corrupt law enforcement system. In his mind he becomes the hero of the oppressed and the hero of reformers making it all the way to capital hill to regale the senate with his misfortunes. I don't doubt that many criminals engage in self-deceptive ego trips, but after 10 or so pages of redundant self-aggrandizement the reader gets the idea. The second line of fantasies involves the brutal torture of the two police officers that arrested the prisoner. In his mind he dehumanizes the policemen in almost every way imaginable. Again, I don't doubt that many convicts engage in this manner of perverse self-pleasure, but it does get somewhat monotonous as every last detail of the gruesome fantasies are laid out time and time again.

This was my first Selby book and it is obvious that he is a talented writer. I am going to give his other books a try.

As an author of sick & disturbing fiction myself ((see: *Hardcore Romeo*)), I am always on the look-out for work that can still upset me. Such novels are few and far between...but 'The Room' is one of them. Selby has, indeed, painted a gruesome portrait of a mind that has become its own hell. You'll find some of the most disturbing acts of sadistic violence this side of Sade himself among the episodes imagined by the imprisoned narrator, including a rape scene that goes on for pages and with such realism its truly painful to read. Other acts--even more unspeakable--have the power to make even the most seasoned reader of violent fiction wince.

One might wonder, 'What was Selby's point here?' One might be tempted to answer that he was simply trying to gross the reader out. Or even simply to write out the worst imaginable crimes.

But I think his motivation was far more disturbing than that.

For every fantasy of inhuman depravity in this novel, there is an equally (unrealistic) fantasy of idealistic humanitarianism. From the grandiose to the bestial...the truly 'scary' thing about this narrator, this book, what Selby is telling us is that BOTH lines of fantasy are coming from the same mind. And that trapped mind is not too different, really, from our own, if we follow our alternating drives for revenge and forgivness, love and hate, etc to their logical extremity.

The narrator in 'The Room' isnt a monster. And that is what is most terrifying of all.

While this may not be -arguably- Selby's best book, one has to remember what his other books are mostly like: masterpieces. The "Room" only falls short because its "trick" might wear thin eventually, but this is by no means a certainty and it really depends on whether you allow it to wear thin.

What the room is, is the mind of a very troubled and very concerned man. This man is concerned because he's confined in a cell with a possible heavy sentence awaiting (his trial pending). What we read throughout the whole book is only what goes on in this man's mind. There is no contact with anyone outside of this man, and all the dialogue to be found happens in his mind as well.

We are treated to a barrage of fantacizing as he imagines the tremendous measures of revenge he will take on those who caused him to be incarcerated, but we are also given a rather incoherent flow of thoughts and fantasies, much like we'd get if we could glimpse into anyone's mind. The uniqueness of this person's mind is that basically anything that breeds in there has the signs of brutality written all over it.

This is obviously not a book for the stomachically weak. Alone the fantasy with the dog training is one of the most brutal descriptions you'll come across in any book, and it spans across several pages. But this is by no means the only "scene" that will make for a gut-wrenching read. This guy has clearly got some issues, and as long as he remains locked up, the only he can work them out is in the confines of his own brain.

Selby delivers the goods in top form, the language is (as usual in his books) very strong and merciless, and while on the surface it looks like one fantasy has no connection oncesoever with the next, the grotesque imagery, and the pattern that keeps (admittedly) slowly developing is akin to a perverse attraction. But, as some will know, perverse attractions have always been succesful.

I don't know of many writers in Selby's league, and that in itself is an understatement actually. I also don't know many writers who'd be succesful even trying to copy him. His talent is multisided, but his strongest asset is how deep inside he gets in his characters, even when he's not speaking directly through their minds.

However, if this would be your first Selby book, i'd advise you not to start from here: it's a rather "difficult" one to start from. Start instead from "Last exit to Brooklyn" or "Requiem for a dream", both will "ease" you into the Selby-oid type of writting and the "Room" will become all the more accesible after that.

A dark, very dark book, that clearly qualifies as one of the gems in the domains of ultragloomy literature.

and when I read the reviewers below proudly saying nonsense like

"this is selby's worst book - True"

it cracks me up. This is probably his most difficult book , because there is only one character and it all takes place in his prison cell and his mind (the 'other' cell in the book) but honestly, this book is probably one of the most important works by an American writer, one of the only ones to touch the brilliance of post-war European literature. It is funny, brutal and a work which will haunt you for a long time. no Im not a kid, by the way, but amazon changed their rules and it's too much of a pain to sign in under the new system.

But I had to write this after reading a stream of negative reviews for this book, written by people who honestly dont seem to know what they are talking about. Literature is not meant to be safe or easy. Go buy a copy of VC Andrews if that's what youre looking for.

First off, I'd like to briefly address previous reviewer Haseeb's warning for the dog lovers out there. The 'dog' scenes do not involve dogs, but rather the main character's antagonists in the role of dogs. The main character fantasizes of training these human beings to be 'obedient dogs'. There is no animal cruelty here (except for an unfortunate rat), but rather human cruelty. Don't go runnin' to the SPCA on this one.

As for the book, it takes a strong will to read, but it's also like a car wreck that you just can't take your eyes off of. It is truly a harrowing read, the protagonist ceaselessly dragging us down with him into his endless cycle of neurotic despair and obsessive fantasies. There is something here about a damaged soul refusing to take on responsibility for itself... about refusing to internalize his locus of control. Everything is everybody else's fault, everything bad in his life happens to him, not because of him. The only responsibility the protagonist is concerned with is fantasizing about getting his pound of flesh, getting back at 'those who screwed him'. He obsesses over getting back at the cops, and the system, to a point that reality simply does not exist anymore, and when he does eventually have to deal with the outside world again, he is at a total loss as to how to deal with it.

It is a despairingly bleak novel, and if my review seems a bit disjointed and rambling, wait until you read Selby's book, as it's got nothin' on that. I recommend the book, but as one other reviewer said, only for those who are ready for it. If you're one of the happy shiney people out there, you probably won't get much out of it, but if on the other hand you're one who has at one point or another wondered why you just can't get a break, or why someone you've known just wouldn't 'buck up and get a grip', you should check out The Room.

Room by Hubert Selby Jr is a slow painful ride into Hell. This isn't the path to the fiery pits but, to null. In this book Selby presents a man who is slowly and inexorably losing his mind in prison. The Room is no fast paced page turner, this book isn't for those seeking instant literary gratification. Both the pace and Selby's style of little punctuation and long thick paragraphs can make for a tedious read at times but, in my opinion this book is worth sticking with.

Room delves into the sick fantasies of a man locked not only in prison but in his own head. His decline is vividly and painfully described in scenes that run the gambit from bittersweet memories of first sexual fumblings to highly detailed sado-masochistic visions of vengance. All in all The Room delivers. I recommend this book for those willing to take the long way to madness.

After reading about this book, I decided to pick it up. I was a little wary, as most of the reviews on amazon were from people who sounded like they got off on violence for the sake of violence. Way too many "oh man, this is so sick and twisted! People with weak stomachs should stay away! People who like to be disturbed will love this!" for my taste.

However, I had two reasons for taking a chance with this book:

1.) Hubert Selby is a pretty decent author. The work may not be as relevant or ground-breaking as he was when he was originally writing, but I'd enjoyed "Last Exit to Brooklyn" and "Requiem for a Dream."

2.) Brutal violence, when used well, can play an important and direct role in a powerful book. For example, Cormac McCarthy, Chuck Palahniuk, Bret Easton Ellis, James Ellroy and some of Selby's other works.

Unfortunately, it serves no such purpose here. I knew exactly what this book was going to be about and what was trying to be said after reading for about 20 minutes. I kept hoping something would be presented in the rest of the book that was not presented in the beginning. Instead, I read pointless fantasy after pointless fantasy. If you want to save yourself the trouble of buying and reading this book, just read the other reviews. The message is not deep, new, or even that interesting. (Short version: A guy's in prison. He thinks he's being screwed over. He really doesn't like the police who arrested him. He has "shocking" fantasies about proving everyone wrong and taking violent revenge on those he perceives as wronging him. zzzzzzzzzzz)

That's it. Unless you are like some of the other reviewers and just want to read "sick and twisted" stuff, save your time and money. And even if you are, I would guess that you could find free violence fantasies on the internet.