You Know You Want This Book Read Free
Fiction
If You Thought 'True cat Person' Was Dark, Await Until You lot Read the Rest of the Book
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Y'all KNOW YOU WANT THIS
Past Kristen Roupenian
225 pp. Picket Press. $24.99.
When Kristen Roupenian's brusk story "Cat Person" went viral upon its publication in The New Yorker in December 2017, I was possibly the only person who didn't read information technology. Partly because it was the stop of the semester, and partly because the prospect of an excruciatingly accurate story about dating had as much appeal every bit the idea of some other bad date.
So I had the privilege of reading all 12 stories in Roupenian's debut, "You lot Know You Desire This," largely unaware of the singular life of "Cat Person," and free from preconceived notions or expectations. I was really surprised by what I read — by how exciting, smart, perceptive, weird and dark this collection is.
The stories are stylistically consistent, but thematically so distinct that reading them felt like rampage-watching 12 completely different, intense movies. "Y'all Know Y'all Want This" is probably all-time digested ane or two stories at a time, merely I kept getting lured into another and some other simply by Roupenian'southward first sentences: "The Class Six girls were bad, and everyone knew information technology," "This is Marla's first wine afternoon with the moms since The Incident," "Ellie was a biter." (Or there's the commencement sentence of "The Practiced Guy," which can't be printed here.)
One story is most an increasingly precarious sex activity game, another almost an 11-year-old's birthday party gone wrong. There'southward a princess fairy tale, a guy in the Peace Corps who'south tormented past his students, a bachelorette party with a special invitee from a dirty movie — and that'due south merely the half of it.
Every bit varied as Roupenian's stories are, they all clearly come from the same brain, 1 of those brains that experience out-of-this-world brilliant and also completely askew — like those of Karen Russell, George Saunders, Mary Gaitskill.
In addition to her simple, punchy opening lines, Roupenian likes to begin stories at truthful beginnings, similar childhood or a brand-new human relationship, her tales oftentimes ones of maturation in fast-forrard. She also has a distinct method of ending, which I tin only describe every bit pushing her characters and their plights off the deep end. These stories go really dark, really fast, ofttimes in the final page or ii. That's especially the case with the outset story in the volume — "Bad Boy," the one about the sex game. If you lot tin handle its brutal conclusion, y'all can likely handle the residue of the collection.
I'll say here that I'm not usually a fan of the nighttime, creepy or supernatural. My imagination holds onto those things for too long; I tin't milk shake them. But the power of these stories transcends any one genre or chemical element. Ultimately they're about what it means to be human. In "Sardines," a picked-on daughter makes a "mean" wish for her altogether, and gets a complicated sort of revenge on her bullies. In "The Mirror, the Saucepan, and the Old Thigh Bone," a princess falls in love with a figure in a cloak, which turns out to be an inanimate reflection of herself. I had a hard time determining exactly why I felt so moved by that story, just I sensed I too would be happier with that mirror, saucepan and thigh bone as a partner than with most of my dates.
"The Matchbox Sign" relates a human'south perspective on his girlfriend's peel condition: "What if she really is hosting some kind of exotic infestation, and because of David's poorly timed outburst, the medico wrongly consigned her to the realm of the mentally ill, drugging her into a mute endurance of her hurting?" Oof. In "Biter," a woman fantasizes nearly bitter her new co-worker, and when he eventually forcibly kisses her, she finally feels she can get away with information technology. "That was awful," she thinks following his attack. "Worse than being bitten. Truly grotesque. But and then, she thought, oh right. Here's my run a risk." I was specially disturbed past how much I enjoyed that story, as some kind of demented #MeToo-era manifesto.
As for "Cat Person": I hope the story'southward hype doesn't define Roupenian's career, because she tin practise so much more. That story is just as precise and perfectly minimal equally the rest of this drove, but the content is somewhat less interesting; mayhap its appeal is past now more a reflection of the expectations and experiences of its readers — our collective response to the gray areas of modern dating. What's special about "Cat Person," and the balance of the stories in "You Know You lot Desire This," is the writer's skilful control of language, graphic symbol, story — her ability to write stories that experience told, and yet so unpretentious and accessible that we think they must be truthful.
You Know You Want This Book Read Free
Source: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/22/books/review/you-know-you-want-this-kristen-roupenian.html
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