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Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
Billy Schine is a wanted man, in the worst possible way. A glum, rudderless 28-year-old Harvard grad, he has defaulted on his student loan, and the brutish collection agency that has taken over his debt is not playing around. To escape, Billy quits his temp job and hightails it out of Manhattan to be a guinea pig in an experimental drug trial. As the title of Gilbert's witty first novel suggests, Billy is part of a healthy control group used to ferret out the possible side effects of an anti-psychotic. Gilbert, author of the short story collection Remote Feed, surrounds Billy with an oddball cast of normals, including an aspiring actor who practices his craft by faking symptoms and an oversexed femme fatale on a very self-involved quest. But the book's most compelling action is interior, as Billy grapples with his place in life and tries to come to terms with his parents' kamikaze love for each other. Fast-paced and winningly insouciant if sometimes self-consciously showy, this is a fine debut that uses humor to tackle some very serious issues, including questions of medical ethics, the search for grace and the meaning of love.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
From The New Yorker
Two weeks as a human guinea pig in a pharmaceutical company's drug-testing facility seems like a good idea to twenty-eight-year-old Billy Schine, pursued by debt collectors and desperate for money. But he hasn't counted on the other "normals" with whom he is confined, as they await the possible side effects of an antipsychotic drug. These include a budding nymphomaniac, an alcoholic repeat tester, a bombastic aspiring actor waiting for his big break as a courtier in "Hamlet," and a withdrawn, Bible-quoting country boy who veers dangerously close to true psychosis. Everyone here is trying to avoid the realities of life beyond the ward, and much of the novel's antic humor derives from Gilbert's unerring grasp of America's varied forms of self-medication. But what makes this first novel memorable is its exploration of the contradictory desire both to escape the world and to be plunged back into it.
Copyright © 2005 The New Yorker
See all Editorial Reviews
Billy Schine is a wanted man, in the worst possible way. A glum, rudderless 28-year-old Harvard grad, he has defaulted on his student loan, and the brutish collection agency that has taken over his debt is not playing around. To escape, Billy quits his temp job and hightails it out of Manhattan to be a guinea pig in an experimental drug trial. As the title of Gilbert's witty first novel suggests, Billy is part of a healthy control group used to ferret out the possible side effects of an anti-psychotic. Gilbert, author of the short story collection Remote Feed, surrounds Billy with an oddball cast of normals, including an aspiring actor who practices his craft by faking symptoms and an oversexed femme fatale on a very self-involved quest. But the book's most compelling action is interior, as Billy grapples with his place in life and tries to come to terms with his parents' kamikaze love for each other. Fast-paced and winningly insouciant if sometimes self-consciously showy, this is a fine debut that uses humor to tackle some very serious issues, including questions of medical ethics, the search for grace and the meaning of love.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
From The New Yorker
Two weeks as a human guinea pig in a pharmaceutical company's drug-testing facility seems like a good idea to twenty-eight-year-old Billy Schine, pursued by debt collectors and desperate for money. But he hasn't counted on the other "normals" with whom he is confined, as they await the possible side effects of an antipsychotic drug. These include a budding nymphomaniac, an alcoholic repeat tester, a bombastic aspiring actor waiting for his big break as a courtier in "Hamlet," and a withdrawn, Bible-quoting country boy who veers dangerously close to true psychosis. Everyone here is trying to avoid the realities of life beyond the ward, and much of the novel's antic humor derives from Gilbert's unerring grasp of America's varied forms of self-medication. But what makes this first novel memorable is its exploration of the contradictory desire both to escape the world and to be plunged back into it.
Copyright © 2005 The New Yorker
See all Editorial Reviews
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