Mohsin Hamid, How to Get Filthy Rich in Rising Asia
I really, really liked this novel — I’d never heard of Hamid before, but a friend rec’d it on Twitter:
the book’s structure mimics that of the cheap self-help books sold at sidewalk stands all over South Asia, alongside computer manuals and test-prep textbooks. Each chapter begins with a rule–“Work for Yourself,” “Don’t Fall in Love,” “Be Prepared to Use Violence”–and expertly evolves into a narrative.
The whole thing is written in second person, and none of the characters have names. It might sound gimmicky, but it’s not — the execution is pretty perfect, and really moving.
From chapter six, “Work For Yourself”:
Like all books, this self-help book is a cocreative project… when you read a book, what you see are black squiggles on pulped wood or, increasingly, dark pixels on a pale screen. To transform these icons into characters and events, you must imagine. And when you imagine, you create. It’s in being read that a book becomes a book, and in each of a million different readings a book becomes one of a million different books…
…Readers don’t work for writers. They work for themselves. Therein, if you’ll excuse the admittedly biased tone, lies the richness of reading.
betzistar
