Indecision: A Novel

I'm a similar age to the protagonist so I think I was somewhat predisposed to enjoy this book... I really miss the days when everyone wasn't so terminally online. Yes, probably the guy's shtick would get a little old, but I found him and his up-for-anything-ness charming. A very funny and engaging read with some interesting ideas.

It's funny reading a book about the whiniest generation, particularly when you belong to it. I really liked this book because it reflected back at me a lot of my own worst qualities, which is why I read these kinds of books. To, you know, remind myself of what I'm constantly in danger of being like (or, to be honest, what I'm like a lot of the time).

In fairness, I read this book during the roughest part of the quarter--a time of year when I shouldn't even be reading novels because I have so much work to catch up on because I've spent too much of the early part of the quarter reading novels instead of doing work.

So what are these "worst qualities" I mentioned in the first paragraph? I don't want to use adjectives, so I'll just say it show more was kind of like what I was like during and post-Namibia. That's probably not helpful, so I'll use a phrase Nathan and Libby should remember from post-modern poetry: THINKY DEATH!

And here's the opposite of thinky death: LIVE TO LIVE!

P.S. This review is so long and stupid because I should be writing my final paper for the quarter right now. show less

Indecision is about an unmotivated man named Dwight living in New York City. Dwight is in his late twenties and is stuck in a dead-end job and a dead-end life. Part of Dwight's problem is the pervasive indecision that, in Dwight's opinion, plagues his generation. As a solution to this problem, a pharmaceutical company develops a pill that cures the patient of his inability to make decisions. The pill taker will always know exactly what he or she wants at any given moment. That is as far as I got. I could not finish even half of this pedantic and obnoxious novel.

The premise gave this book so much potential. Too bad Kunkel squandered it with his need to impress and show off. Instead of attempting to write an engaging and interesting show more book, Kunkel used the writing of Indecision as an exercise in vanity. Every sentence seems to scream, "See how smart I am?!" The sentences and paragraphs are convoluted and annoying; the narrator’s voice insufferable.

Everyone knew “that guy” in either high school or college who felt his superior mental acuity gave him the right to condescend to everyone around him; who thought his putdowns were witty and amusing (even if only to himself); who read and quoted philosophers; and whose sarcastic vitriol was a really a shield protecting his inner pain. Well both Dwight and his creator, Benjamin Kunkel, are “that guy”.

If only there was a pill that could make me forget this book! show less

Well-written, funny, and initially engaging. Unfortunately, the story doesn't go anywhere and I liked the characters less and less as the novel went on.

I did laugh several times reading this, which is uncommon for me. I felt like I really got the joke Kunkel was making about the self-absorption we can participate in as North Americans, as well as his mockery of our "raised consciousness". And yet, I didn't think the author was unnecessarily cruel.

Odd thing happend: I have apparently read this book, and not that long ago (I know, because I have made notes in the back which is something I only started doing in the last couple of years) - but then I went and forgot I have read it - I have just completely ERASED the memory of it. This cannot be good, I thought, while re-reading it, and I was right. Somehow I could not muster enough interest for it. The three stars I give because of the quotes I have noted the first time around, which are quite clever, really, and which tell me a little aboutt Kunkel. Here is my favourite, it is from the closing of the book (pg. 270) and I probably really like it right now because I have just returned from a short, but very intensive road trip with a show more large itinerary:

Ever since I was a kid it had always impressed me how through the narrowing operations of travel, and from out of so many possible destinations, places of such incredible specificity will realize themselves right in front of you.

P. 45 Yet I felt xcused in this by our whole collective ownership of the thing, and simply by the nature if Sunday as that recurrent day whose tremendous potential seems much more enjoyable than any actual use of it could be. show less

Imagine you are in your twenties, you live in a rich country, you are healthy, you are reasonably intelligent, you have had an education, actually, you have everything half the world longs for, yet you have a problem too. The problem is this: you have so many possibilities, so many options, so much choice, you just can't decide what to do. You just can't decide, so you end up not making any decisions at all. Life just happens to you, girlfriends or boyfriends come and go, jobs just come on your way, not because you really wanted them, but you just took what came along. I suppose many of us in the "western world" can relate to that situation to some extent.

So just suppose there were a drug curing this state of indecision. A drug that show more would help you to know what you want and go for it. That is the central idea of this book, and as such an interesting and fascinating one. What would happen?
Dwight Wilmerding is the lucky chap who can try this medicine in Benjamin Kunkel's novel that was much hyped when it was published in 2005. A thought provoking theme, a hype, you will understand, my expectations were high.

However, I feel incredibly disappointed! I still can't decide whether this book was supposed to be funny, in a sarcastic way, and wasn't, or if it was supposed to be deep - and wasn't. I may hope that the intention was to be funny about this stereotypical spoiled American in his twenties, and that I just didn't get the humour, because it is too full of references that a non-American wouldn't understand. I just don't hope that this was intended to be serious, because it is so full of complete superficial wannabe deepness, that I just couldn't believe someone would seriously write that, AND be able to find a publisher. No, it must have been intended as a farce...

Apart from that, the story is, well, not very interesting either. We're introduced to Dwights indecisive life in New York, he starts to take the medicine, and things start to happen. He loses his job, he travels to Ecuador, he meets a girl. However, most of what happens is not caused by decisiveness at all. It is still just happening. And he is happy about it. I suppose that's the big message, that you should accept that this is life, full of doubt. Wow. I feel so enlightened now..... show less