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The Well-Red Bear Review of Books

Review

Memoirs and Misinformation

September 11, 2020September 12, 2020 Roy Christopher

Bret Easton Ellis has made a career out of thinly skinning his own experiences with a fictional sheen. All the way back to his college days with Less Than Zero (1985) and The Rules of Attraction (1987) through his layers of postmodernism with Glamorama (2000) and Lunar Park (2006). Given his fictionalized appearance in Lunar… Continue reading Memoirs and Misinformation

Review

The Day of the Drones

July 25, 2020July 25, 2020 Roy Christopher

I read A.M. Lightner’s The Day of the Drones (W.W. Norton, 1968) while doing research for my book Dead Precedents: How Hip-Hop Defines the Future (Repeater Books, 2019). Though I didn’t cite it, the book is notable for its reversal of races (“black is beautiful; white is taboo”) and gender roles.  Lightner wrote several novels and… Continue reading The Day of the Drones

Review

David Grubbs: A Meaningful Pause

May 19, 2020May 19, 2020 Roy Christopher

David Grubbs has been making notes and noise for decades, from his involvement with bands like Squirrel Bait, Bastro, and the Red Krayola to his many solo and collaborative efforts. His and Jim O’Rourke’s record under the Gastr del Sol name, Crookt, Crackt, or Fly (Drag City, 1994), remains a post-rock touchstone. He still composes… Continue reading David Grubbs: A Meaningful Pause

Review

Help Your Self

April 29, 2020April 29, 2020 Roy Christopher

I always found it frustrating that self-help books are often lumped in with psychology books at the bookstore. Their mingling on the shelves seemed to do at least one of them a disservice. Even given my bias, I’ve always been mildly fascinated with self-help as a genre. In The Self-Help Compulsion: Searching for Advice in… Continue reading Help Your Self

Review

Ethnic Recurring: Charles Yu

March 14, 2020March 14, 2020 Roy Christopher

Privilege is a kind of blindness. Open doors are invisible. We only see them when they’re closed. Charles Yu’s Interior Chinatown happens entirely in liminal spaces. It’s all in the edges and on the edge. It’s just as Manuel DeLanda writes in A New Philosophy of Society (2006): “In the case of ethnic communities, for… Continue reading Ethnic Recurring: Charles Yu

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