I picked this up in Powell's. It was an impulse purchase, really. I was standing in that little corner of the Blue Room, where they have assorted "Bizarro" books (but Powell's doesn't use the word "Bizarro"; I think they call them "Independent/Small Press" but they're all bizarro). The title caught my eye, naturally. The title really sold me, I guess.

Each story is between one and three pages, and I wouldn't quite call them "stories". They're free-form musings and snippets of dialogue. As luck would have it, the first thing I read was the interaction Sam had with a stranger on a bus. A beautiful woman walks by on the street outside, and the stranger nudges Sam and points her out. Kind of a "Hubba hubba, get a load of her" kind of thing. Sam responds loudly "I acknowledge your nudge, and I also see that beautiful woman outside. I take your nudge to mean you'd like to have sexual intercourse with her, and if you're asking me if I would too, then yes- yes, I would also like to have sexual intercourse with her." The stranger, quite uncomfortable by this, withdraws and does not interact with Sam the rest of the ride.

Haha. My first impression is the author is a smartass, and also pretty funny. So I flip through a few more stories, and decide to buy the book.



I get home, and read some more.

The guy has an odd obsession with bones in his hand, and bones in other people's hands. He has dreams about breaking the bones in his hands. When he meets people, as he's shaking their hands, he tries (how, I'm not sure) to assess how strong the bones in their hands are, in case he should ever need to meet them in hand-to-hand combat. Some of it is funny, like the bit the title is derrived from, where he discusses cannibalizing himself by eating his clone. But some of it.. especially the hand bones stuff- gets tedious. At this point, I'm thinking the guy is nuts.



Finishing the book, I hear about these weird dreams where Sam wants to cut his fingers off and sew different fingers on his hand (from where?), a bunch of stuff about wishing he was never born, etc. And then I come across the part, which I really should have seen earlier, if I had been reading more carefully, because it's stated on the back of the book- that Sam Pink is bipolar. So, yeah, he's not "nuts" because I use that term in a comical way to describe somebody who is outside the norm, but I don't really use that term to describe somebody who has a recognized psychiatric condition. He's got a (treatable) disease, so I'm uneasy reading this, because even though some of it really is very funny, I feel like I'm laughing at this:



and that's not fucking funny.

But wait.

Sam Pink wrote this, and he got it published. He knew this book would be interesting, and some of it would be funny. And it is. (some of it) I'm not sure whether I'm reading the product of his disease, or the product of a vivid imagination, of somebody who has just seen the world (especially before his diagnosis and treatment) from a very different angle than I have. Now I'm confused... am I exploiting Sam and making fun of his condition, or am I laughing along with him at some stuff he himself chuckles at and admits is kind of "out there"? Or am I taking part in his therapy because he somehow needs to share his experiences?

Or all of the above?

Or none of the above?

To tell the truth, I think this book has made me a little crazy. ( )