Sam Lipsyte's "The Ask" and Kurt Vonnegut

Lord there’s something important about Vonnegut’s writing. I’ll have to expand on this further, but apparently what I really want to say is that Sam Lipstyle’s The Ask has put me in an unproductive and slightly vindictive mood. I finished it around three, and meant to get right to business writing a response, but didn’t. Instead, I watched TV for… five hours. As far as wasting time goes, TV does a fine job, and what it did this afternoon was allow me to not think about The Ask and Milo Burke’s hateful person. I disliked Milo intensely, and while it’s likely this was Lipstyle’s intent, it did not make The Ask a pleasurable read. Everything about him, from his art school background and resulting self importance (shit that’s me) to his terrible job, his narrow, egotistical but witty commentary on everything that always loops back to himself, and his not quite self-deprecating but seemingly effacing dialog with his own member made my hackles rise. Save me from another daydream about your penis between some woman’s breasts. It wasn’t even hot. Save me from having to read about your existential crisis, because I hate the way you sound, and because you sound like me. And what about Milo’s wife? The only character I wanted to know more about was left frustratingly underdeveloped. Writing this response is making me angry, and I don’t want to be angry. Because Lipstyle has a gift for dialog, for witticisms and for noticing the parts of people that are uncertain, shameful, and human. Maybe I disliked it because I want my heroes to be models for my life, not to be my life. Really. Escapism, you say? Not even a little. I know who I am, most of the time. You can write about all these things (uncertainty, shame, and being human) and still be inspiring. Beautiful.