A fascinating exploration of the effect conspiracy theory has had on American culture and discourse. Mr. Knight does an excellent job of clarifying the diverse phenomena and definitions which have become attached to the phrase "conspiracy theory", in the process building an impressive theory of conspiracy as the meta-narrative currently acting in our culture to help us process the overwhelming and contradictory information we are all exposed to daily. Includes some great lit-crit stuff about Delillo and Pynchon and an amazing chapter on popular Feminism as conspiracy theory.

A few years ago I came across an essay in an issue of the Village Voice Literary supplement by a more or less unknown author named Jonathan Lethem who was arguing that the science fiction community had betrayed its own potential when it refused, in 1974, to give the Hugo or Nebula award to a novel nominated that year by the name of 'Gravity's Rainbow'. Of course, this caught my attention and I've been watching Lethem's career ever since.

Around the time of the essay in the VVLS, Lethem's work tended to be thought of as ambitious, but not very successful literary sci-fi. In 2000 he garnered a lot of praise and a National Book Critics award for his book Motherless Brooklyn; a formulaic mystery novel with the added wordplay created by a narrator with Tourett's syndrome. This started out very strong, but seemed to become bored with itself by the end. So, for me, Lethem's work always seemed to be on the verge, but never quite successful.

Well, so, the point here obviously being that his new work, The Fortress of Solitude, is the novel which has finally placed him in the (very small) company of truly respectable American writers. Fortress is an ambitious work that paints a vivid portrait of urban America in the last half of the 20th century that resonates with the same awareness of time, place, and the unspoken and embarrassing truth about ourselves that I think is compelling in the work of early 20th century writers such as Edith Wharton, Ralph Ellison, and John Dos Passos. Some passages of Fortress are simply beautiful to read, exhibiting a control of the English language that I rarely find in many of the popular contemporary writers (Chabon and Eggers come to mind as failures here).

Lethem's sensitive and expert handling of pop-culture history makes it shockingly apparent how little real, successful work has been done that can represent the truly poignant childhood memories of the gen-x for a world filled with Hannah-Barbera cartoons, comic books, and the great rock-funk-soul-punk era of music. The literature of the boomer generation has so saturated our awareness with that particular generation's pop-culture concerns that we tend to not even recognize it as such until a writer like Lethem points out the validity of a younger experience; not in a tongue in cheek way like Douglas Coupland, but with a humble seriousness that pays respect to his own generation. He even goes so far as to incorporate what might be called a "magical realism" element that is a direct and unapologetic homage to a generation raised on comic books.

What is most impressive about Fortress, however, is the way Lethem is able to make these different elements revolve effortlessly around the true core of this novel: an unflinching meditation on the effects of race and class in a post civil-rights era world. As seen through the eyes of a young white boy growing up in an overwhelmingly African-American neighborhood in the 70s, the world of Fortress slowly unveils the last quarter of America's 20th century as a schizophrenic battle between the triumph of African-American culture even as it is buried under the yolk of poverty and Crack, and the love/hate relationship that white America has always had with the Other. Dylan, the young white protagonist, loves his black friend Mingus and wants to be accepted by his neighbors even as he fears their attention. And as the characters and the novel grow, the tragic shame of America's prison-industrial complex is mirrored by Dylan's withdrawal from his responsibilities to his friend and his past.

With this novel Lethem has joined the small, but growing, ranks of great American gen-x writers such as William Vollman and David Foster Wallace. The Fortress of Solitude may turn out to be one of the representative novels of my generation.

Charles.

In 1984 William Gibson changed the face of Science Fiction when he published his first novel, "Neuromancer". Overnight serious SF abandoned its jingoistic-epic tradition and became a contemporary forum for dystopian social commentary. "Neuromancer" single-handedly created the sub-genre of Cyberpunk; a literary trend that dominates SF books and films to this day. Gibson's ability to extrapolate current social trends into the near future, and his concern for the classic existential elements of 20th century literature make him one of the few serious speculative fiction authors of the last twenty years. In that first book, Gibson coined phrases and invented concepts that we now take for granted in pop culture; and his handling of the potential of virtual reality raises disturbing philosophical issues that read very much like the mystical paranoia of Philip K. Dick. His work since "Neuromancer" has consistently dealt with these literary and philosophical themes.

Graeber is an anarchist, an anthropologist who has appeared on the Charlie Rose show, worked with the Direct Action Network as part of the anti-globalization movement, has been credited with writing the first academic article about ‘Buffy the Vampire Slayer’, and is most well known here at Skylight as the author of the popular little manifesto: ‘Fragments of an Anarchist Anthropology’. His work has the very refreshing quality of being rigorous without being ghettoized by academic-speak. He is one of those rare academics, like Pierre Bourdieu and Giorgio Agamben, who is not afraid to address the political implications of his professional work; a quality that is very exciting for those of us who have suspected that the discipline of anthropology has much to offer in the struggle against authoritarianism. This new collection of essays, brought to us by those heroes at AK Press, is a major tool to be used for spanking your inner policeman.

This author's first novel seems to aspire to the kind of artistic tightrope act that I've come to love; work that strikes a balance between the heights of the avant garde and the depths of pop culture not unlike Sonic Youth's music or Stanley Kubrick's filmmaking. Danielewski has tried to place the meaning and purpose of this novel, at least partly, in the typography and page layout itself; an ambitious piece of literary deconstruction. On the other hand, the core of the story is surprisingly simple; the kind of gothic horror tale you would find in any H.P. Lovecraft collection. This is well worth the reader's effort and if nothing else, the book itself is beautiful to look at.

A contemporary of, and influence on Pynchon, Barth is one of the great American writer's in the school of meta-fiction and/or postmodern fiction. This novel (considered to be his best)however, does not display most of the trappings of that genre; instead it reads exactly like an 18th century baudy romp in the tradition of Fielding's "Tom Jones". Of course, in the execution of this homage/parody, Barth goes way beyond baudy and straight into levels of perversion and radical politics that would make even most contemporary audiences cringe.

Easily the best psychological exploration of this most famous of
villains since Alan Moore’s ‘The Killing Joke’. The choice of criminal
protégé as narrator works brilliantly and the juxtaposition of the
passionate, scenery chewing Joker with the omnipresent, but offstage
and cold-as-ice Batman throws an almost sympathetic light on the
ultimate nihilist. The finest moments are scenes that subtly and
smartly suggest that rather than being a true sociopath, Joker actually
cares very deeply about his place in the world and especially about the
opinion of the Batman. Azzerello’s work here easily ranks alongside the
other classic texts of these archetypal American myths and has the
potential to be part of the pantheon of great stories that taught us
not to be embarrassed about our love of comics.

Mr. Unsworth won the Booker Prize for this one. At the time I discovered it I had been reading a book on lost and forgotten utopian movements in American history and the subject of the novel dovetailed nicely. However, I didn't expect it to be so beautifully written and emotionally stirring. It has a compelling narrative, but, for me, it was a meditation on the free society, race, the psychology of authoritarianism, and the sacred hunger for capital.

Howard Zinn is the high school teacher I wish I’d had. In interviews he describes himself as a self-taught historian even though he has a Ph.D. from Columbia. His point is that almost all of the material in his “People’s History…” had to be discovered and researched independently as none of it was ever part of his professional education. And that’s the point; this book covers history that is almost never part of the curriculum. From the first page, where he quotes Columbus advocating a policy of deception in order to enslave the natives, to the last chapter, where he documents Clinton’s quiet dismantling of the New Deal, habeas corpus, and the 1st amendment, Zinn is unrelenting in his condemnation of the myth of American History. It is, by turns, engrossing, depressing, and enraging, but it is never boring. This twentieth anniversary edition adds about a hundred pages of new material, so even if you’re already familiar with this text it’s worth having this nice cloth version of the book that taught us the true meaning of American Ingenuity.

This first work by the famous French philosopher was written when he was only 21 years old at the behest of his Freudian therapist. Although short enough to read in one sitting, this story embodies all the major themes that were to become his life's work: sex, death, violence, critique of Western dualist thought, and the search for enlightenment through extreme self-debasement. Its obsession with the harsh visceral nature of human existence is, paradoxically, intensely spiritual, inexplicably making this probably the most erotically charged novel I have ever read.

Spanning the period between the Chicago World's Fair of 1893 and the years just after World War I, this novel moves from the labor troubles in Colorado to turn-of-the century New York, to London and Gottingen, Venice and Vienna, the Balkans, Central Asia, and elsewhere.

Anyone who is a fan of the work of William Gibson, Neal Stephenson or Bruce Sterling should already be familiar with Mr. Shirley; if not, take heed. Both Gibson and Sterling have been known to sing his praises in interviews and both cite him as influential to their work. He is included in every cyberpunk anthology that I know of and is considered part of the pantheon. Unfortunately, most of his work has been out of print for years; it being the victim of the rise to power of the marketing dept. in publishing houses. Now that may be changing with the release of two collections of stories and the reissue of the "A Song Called Youth" (or "Eclipse") trilogy. The trilogy is considered one of the lost masterpieces of the cyberpunk genre. I personally spent almost five years tracking down all three volumes in used bookstores and am glad I did. Now's your chance.

Most of the best that Pop Culture has to offer these days (X-Files, Simpsons, Hip-Hop, Buffy, David Fincher, Spike Jonze, etc.) exhibits a distinct interest in the same ideas, techniques and self-aware anxieties that were part of the high literary challenge of the great masters of the middle of the 20th century (Pynchon, Gaddis, Barth, Coover, etc.). The interesting, maybe ironic, thing now is how that post-modern sensibility has now returned to its original medium in the works of DFW, Eggers, Danielewski and now Carson, but with the distinctly user-friendly attitude we expect from Pop. In fact, Carson's new novel may be the most successful in bringing this heady tradition to the average reader. By examining the American century through the eyes of the characters from a bad 60's TV show, he has created a rich and layered text that is by turns hilarious, poignant and sharply critical without marginalizing itself with overwrought prose. I'm hoping this one will be big with the kids in '03.