Try [Paperback]

Dennis Cooper (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 9, 1995

Simultaneously deadpan and queasily raw, Try is the story of Ziggy, the adopted teenage son of two sexually abusive fathers. He turns from both of these men to his uncle, who sells porn videos on the black market, and to his best friend, a junkie.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Ziggy is the adopted teenaged son of two sexually abusive fathers, from whose obsessive attentions he flees into the weird world of his uncle, an amoral man who makes violent pornography. As scenes of fierce sex and sadistic oppression take place around him, Ziggy falls improbably in love -- with his best friend, a junkie. Dennis Cooper, author of the gay horror classic Frisk, returns in this novel to his characteristic themes of alienated youth, voyeurism and twisted Todenlust, except this time the horrors are as grounded in emotions as they are in the body.

From Publishers Weekly

Cooper's disturbing new novel, like Frisk and Closer , explores the gritty, homoerotic subculture of a nondescript California suburb while chronicling two days in the life of Ziggy, the adolescent, adopted son of two sexually abusive gay fathers. Angelically beautiful and extremely insecure, Ziggy scarcely sleeps or attends high school, but struggles to articulate his own emotional life by compiling the latest issue of his fanzine, a crude journal about sexual abuse called "I Apologize." Ziggy's unlikely mentors include his uncle Ken, who produces child pornography, his friend Calhoun, an aspiring writer who has withdrawn into a heroin-induced haze, and Roger, the less violent of his two fathers, who, with Humbert Humbert-like detachment, extolls the virtues of Ziggy's anatomy. Cooper's narrative, clinical and often pornographic, rigorously refrains from moralizing. Cutting cinematically back and forth between characters, his prose is jumpy and convoluted when describing Ziggy, dazed and analytical when depicting Calhoun, drained of affect when chronicling the appalling antics of Ziggy's uncle, who spends much of the novel drugging and raping a 13-year-old heavy metal fan he has picked up somewhere. Cooper's novel is less a case study in sexual abuse, however, than a window on a nightmarish suburban world, where domestic norms are subverted to such a degree that adults are either pointedly absent or predatory pedophiles, and where stunted but angelic teenagers take solace in drugs, sexual promiscuity and punk rock.
Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 208 pages
• Publisher: Grove Press (March 9, 1995)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 080213338X
• ISBN-13: 978-0802133380
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.5 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.8 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #537,533 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars A Shocker!, September 8, 2007

By 

Benjamin (UK) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: Try (Paperback)

I do not think that I am one normally to be shocked by what I read, but I did find Dennis Cooper's Try coming into that category. The story, about Ziggy, a boy adopted by two abusive gay men, is an idea perhaps with great potential. However I found it thoroughly distasteful; distasteful as regards the literal filth in which they seemed to revel, and distasteful in that it lacked any redeeming features, above all it lacked heart. I found it to be a thoroughly depressing read.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars this or "Guide" best for non-initiates, June 27, 2006

By 

ignacio f. (Aloha OR) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Try (Paperback)

Cooper is the American Jean Genet and some aspects of his subject-matter may scare people off, but he writes amazingly beautiful prose, has an incredible ear for dialogue, and is quite funny even at his most dark. "Try" is actually a very appealing, offbeat love-story. Give Dennis Cooper a, well, try.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars beautiful without trying, August 5, 2004

By 

Civil Savage (Albuquerque, NM) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Try (Paperback)

this is definitely my favorite of the 5-book series (frisk, try, guide, closer, period) that Cooper penned. i had admired his work from afar because for the longest time his choice of subject matter and deadpan prose often made me feel estranged from the characters and their situations. however, there is something to be said for his work as it has managed to attain a certain kind of distinguishment in my eyes which is perhaps an entirely personal sentiment, although a case could be made that it's not entirely personal. but i won't try.

about the book: it is one of the most "emotional" of the 5-book series and has some of the most haunting passages and easy-to-identify characters (as far as the characters in Cooper's universe are concerned anyway!): the abusive father, the tragically misunderstood young man, the twisted relative, the aloof and obsessed admirer, and the suicidal compatriot. while there are a few other minor characters the above named are the most poignant and fully fleshed out (the aloof and obsessed admirer is narrated in the first-person) it helps to better understand just how difficult it is for the central character to relate to anyone, to understand their motives and situations, and ultimately to foresee any consequences. there is less of a recklessness in Cooper's storytelling with this novel and has perhaps the most optimistic "protagonist" of all the novels. this is saying a lot considering one of the story's more gruesome happenings, which is told in chillingly minimal language. in spite of these twists and turns in character development and plot cohesiveness the story reads fairly easy (if you're accustomed to Cooper's work) and is perhaps one of the most easily accessible as far as characterization and emotional depth go. but be warned, Cooper's writing has been and always will be for mature audiences only.