Book Review- Richard Hine's Russell Wiley is Out to Lunch

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Richard Hine's novel Russell Wiley is Out to Lunch was on the Amazon monthly Kindle deals earlier this summer and I took a chance on it. 

 Protagonist, Russell Wiley is in his mid-thirties and his life is falling apart. He is stuck in a loveless marriage and his career, as an executive at a major newspaper, has an expiration date. Wiley is a desperate man surrounded by desperate people. His coworkers are ruthless, each trying to stay one-step ahead of lay-offs and Wiley must manage them, while trying to keep his own head off of the chopping block. He can't figure out how to fix his marriage and his home life has become unbearable. He is even beginning to question to strength of his bond with his childhood best friend. Wiley's entire life is on the brink of monumental change and this is the story of how everything plays out. 

Immediately, the story grabbed me. Hine has a slick, modern writing style. It's catchy. I liked his main characters and enjoyed the office scheming. The story read like a more realistic, less comedic version of Office Space. It's relatable to anyone who has had to deal with office politics. The story would probably resonate very strongly with anyone who has been laid-off or who has dealt with a company about to go under. Luckily, I've not had either experience!

Unfortunately, the story failed to hold my interest. It gets a bit too bogged down in mundane details, especially those pertaining to the newspaper company. Sometimes it felt like reading a business manual. I felt like Hine must have worked in a similar environment to have written a novel filled with so many dull details.  

The ending didn't fit with the tone of the overall story. Everything wrapped up quickly in a neat package that was somewhat surreal. The overall story needed to be a bit more wacky to fit with the ending. It felt tacked on and unnatural. 

I often got the minor characters mixed up. There were too many characters in the office to keep track of them all. It would have read easier, if Hine had focused only on those most pertinent to the story, rather than trying to give info on so many different characters. This story should have been an easy read, but the details and onslaught of characters, made me work double-time to keep it all straight. 

I finished the book within a few days, but was left feeling underwhelmed. Hine is a talented writer, but this story could have been a lot stronger.  

Book Review- Jess Walter's We Live in Water: Stories

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I often give five-star reviews to books that I thought were great for their genre, even if they would not necessarily make my favorites list.

Jess Walter's collection of short stories, We Live In Water,  not only deserves five-stars, but it makes it to my highly selective favorite books list. 

Walter's collection is absolutely fantastic and I cannot believe that this is the first time that I have encountered his writing. A big THANK YOU to Amazon for putting, We Live in Water on their Kindle discount list a few months ago. It often pays to take a chance on a new-to-you author.  

Walter's prose is often beautiful, but the stories in this collection are the polar opposite. Walter takes us to dark places filled with damaged characters. His stories are gritty, stark and haunting. You will feel uncomfortable reading this collection.

Pretty much none of his characters are like myself or people that I know. However, Walter's talent as a writer shines with his ability to make even the more difficult characters human and relatable. Every story felt like embarking on a different adventure into hell and I wanted a ticket for the ride.

I was most taken by his story Don't Eat Cat about a dystopian society where some of the citizens have decided that their lives would be better if they took a drug that turns them into zombies. This story is different from the rest in the collection. It is the only one that dips into the realm of fantasy. It features zombies, but not in a way that is conventional or like anything else I've seen in pop-culture. The story is overwhelmingly sad and unforgettable. In all of his stories, there a twist and an unexpected angle. I loved this constant element of surprise. Walters is a writer with a unique perspective. 

Another stand-out was the very last story in the collection, Statistical Abstract for My Hometown of Spokane, Washington. I finished this story, unsure of whether or not it was fiction. It felt very much like a personal reveal of the author, who is from Spokane, a city that very much influences his writing. Many of the stories are set in or make mention of Spokane. Whether or not it's fiction, this last story is a hard one to read. It has amazing pacing, where it grows in steam and intensity. It's a listing of facts that read like a monologue in a play. It's so powerful.

It's safe to say that I'm now going to read everything that has ever been written by Walters. He completely blew me away.