Customer Reviews

The Whole

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4 star:		(2)
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There's a great review of this book online -- there's a good one at PopMatters -- so I'm limiting my comments to the book's use of language. Reed makes use of double entendre and malapropism to great effect here, and he slowly ramps up the level of absurdity to a point where meaninglessness might actually turn into meaning. It kind of melts your brain, this book, but that isn't a bad thing.

Thing was selected for certain symmetrical assets that caught the bulging lusty eyes of MTV executives at a beach party. Surprisingly she hits it off with the viewing public and becomes a correspondent though she has the intelligence of a burned out light bulb. She is promoted as blond bimbo candy based on her garb unable to contain her twin peaks. However, seemingly even faster than Thing becomes a superstar, she becomes yesterday's fad.

As Thing plays chutes and ladders with fame, a Midwestern boy Bobby Peterson digs a hole that expands until his and his family and their house fall through the chasm. Thing begins to research the phenomena which she feels will bring her salvation. However, clues take on a strange journey through a land of mysticism highlighted in remote sign posts like Vegas and Roswell.

This is a strange tale that satirizes media coverage (to include a parody of John Reed) as being filled with sound and fury but signifying nothing more than an MTV video. Readers will feel for Thing, who is treated with disdain for having a boob size bigger than her IQ and enjoy the irony of the weird, but fun story line. Obviously most readers will not give Mr. Reed's tale a SNOWBALL'S CHANCE, but fans who enjoy a trip into a modern day looking glass led by a Black Rabbit and a Thing, though lacking in the wits and puns of Alice's holey escapade, will want to escape into the WHOLE tale.

Harriet Klausner

And weird, weird weird. A black rabbit and pink cocktails, and an MTV Blonde. Funny, but leaves you shaking.

Is there an ethical paradigm in cataclysmic geologic disaster?John Reed's newscaster protagonist Thing(das Ding?) spins out the querie as she broadcasts television coverage of the Whole in a story that comes at you like a frizbee.Language dances in every direction spewing hilarious puns and deliberate misnomers to boost an uncanny satirical plot.

This book can be read as a simple story, or you can delve into many layers of parody and meaning. It's a searing indictment of pop culture... published by MTV books.

Other people have written some nice reviews of it, so I'll be brief. I'm getting it as a gift for my teenage niece in Los Angeles. I think she'll understand it quite well.

The world is flat, the lobster aliens are in control, and Thing is a Bovinity. Believe. It all makes sense.

John Reed (A STILL SMALL VOICE) makes fantastic, thought-provoking use of the English language in a way that few are able to. His irony and humor bring absurdity to everyday observations of pop culture (and the ultimate irony? It is published by MTV books!), to the point that one laughs out loud (LOL!), when similarities to one's self are noted. At first judgement-by-cover, it appears to be a fun, light read put out by MTV, but Reed's use of language, irony, and insight make it anything but.


And the ending?? Oy, ve! The image created will forever remain in my mind. What animal are YOU?