Exley Book

Hmm...let's see...how do I convince my fellow Goodreads users that Exley, a book criminally under-read, meh-reviewed, and the (as 2012 draws to a close) best novel I've read this year so far, is a book worth reading??? Maybe compare it to Mark Haddon's The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time??? (Well no, despite it having a precocious young narrator like Curious Incident it's nothing at all like it [Not to mention, my very last review {Pigeon English} made that very-same comparison...my Goodreads Friends will think I have a screw loose]). Echo the jacket blurb that compares Brock Clarke to Richard Ford and John Irving??? (Um, no. Despite my love of both those novelists, there's nothing there to compare). Mention my favorite book last year (2011)??? (Oh, hell-to-the-no, Karen Russell's pissed-on-by-the-Pulitzers gem Swamplandia! gets no love from Goodreads either, languishing in 3.1-star-rating-land).

Let's just go with a screw-loose-upstairs supposition and see if I can draw in some kooky like-minded Goodreads folks that way:

The somewhat tired trope unreliable narrator has never been a more accurate descriptor for a novel. For Exley's got two of them and they're both wackadoodle (or are they?!?) Nine year old eighth grader Miller (of Watertown NY) suffers from delusions that his father (a nearly 40-something marginally employed layabout, recently disappeared) was sent to Iraq and was injured there, to be sent home to the local VA hospital. His mother, a lawyer and battered women's advocate, sends Miller to a psychologist to disabuse him of his silly notions. So enters the second unreliable narrator, Miller's psychologist, who in his fascination over Miller's "delusions", starts losing touch with reality himself. The narrative ping-pongs between delusional patient and increasingly delusional "mental health professional", with the reader (i.e. Me...and, hopefully, if you're one of the aforementioned Goodreads' screw-loose set that I can convince to read this novel, you) desperately trying to figure out who's the crazier one as you solve the mystery of Dad's disappearance. I, for the first time, I think ever, re-read the book immediately after finishing, not only because I loved it so much, but to clarify the sources of all my WTF-inducing head scratches upon first read. So, yeah, maybe having a screw or two loose is a prerequisite for enjoyment. Just read it. It's a (total head) trip.

(Did I mention that Exley borrows liberally and often (and derives its title) from another book? Yeah, another lesser-read "novel" A Fan's Notes: a Fictionalized Memoir by Frederick Exley, a 1968 "cult classic" by, who some have deemed, the East Coast Charles Bukowski. Miller's dad (and, evidently, Exley author Brock Clarke) loved loved loved this book and young Miller used it (and quoted passages from it) with fervent intent in trying to piece together his father's disappearance...brilliantly, I might add. (And yet another selling point for Exley lost on everyone: Less than 2000 Goodreads users deigned to rate Exley's A Fan's Notes...yet two of my Goodreads pals HAVE read it...so maybe it's a start...)

Just read Exley, folks. It'll drive you nuts.