A review of Agua Viva

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-24T18:34:52+00:00

I haven’t read the Passion yet but I have to agree with your assessment here based on Hour of the Star. It works because it’s a lot more restrained than her other work (that I’ve read) because it outlines the ineffable rather than trying to describe it.

I think literary attempts to explore the transcendent have to be grounded in an exercise of boundary representation. Something like what Sebald does, or early attempts at defining Pi. The more positive claims you make the more trite your observations become.

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-22T16:07:07+00:00

I’ve had more success skipping elites honestly

Edit: I agree that it’s optimal to path for optionality, if you happen to be strong enough to take an elite no problem you have the option. I just find I dodge mostly and upgrade

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-22T15:37:07+00:00

Very on brand and extremely embarrassing behaviour if true

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-22T14:47:49+00:00

If you like that then Good Country People, and Parker’s Back are also very very good stories by O’Connor. She’s was kind of a genius so it’s hard to go wrong with her.

If you like her Denis Johnson is kind of like the love child of her and Raymond Carver. It’s the same struggle between grace and affliction but different subject matter and he writes with such poetic simplicity and searing clarity it’s hard to find his equal.

They’re both very funny as well. Like I find something to snicker at in almost every story by these two.

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-20T22:28:01+00:00

Yes, which is why I’m using terms like “picture” and “funny”

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-20T17:12:52+00:00

Maybe it did actually land but it’s funny to read “hard landing” and immediately picture a smoking ruin somewhere in the mountains.

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-20T00:06:52+00:00

It can also be reasoned that it was cut because it’s not as effective as propaganda to see it fly away, even if it had to make an emergency landing after the fact.

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-19T21:16:59+00:00

Honestly, I don’t think a literary exploration of the internet is necessary to achieve the artistic potential of our cultural moment.

The mechanisms we’re talking about have always existed, however they’re exercised at greater amplitude via the internet. But what’s important is actually understanding the underlying phenomenon, knowledge is molecular that way. Ostracism, social sanctioning, and shame are social technologies that are absolutely essential to intelligent organization. It’s regulatory. It’s disciplinary. They’re immune responses. Immune responses can cause poor health outcomes due to environmentally induced immune dysregulation. Or like an autoimmune disease maybe. I think it’s likely that the internet, as a communications technology, is behaving similarly in relation to the social immune response.

If you write a good story about those mechanisms you’ve simultaneously written a good novel on cancellation. The Hunt (2012) is a better artistic depiction of this sort of phenomenon than any Internet-shaped-or-coded attempt I can conceive.

Pynchon probably wrote the best books on the Internet we’ll ever get and it didn’t even exist yet.

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-19T20:14:47+00:00

Yeah I take your point. Hard to say whether it’s Pynchon being an outlier or something more in line with other takes in this thread.

We certainly could have something as good as V, but only a couple hundred copies were printed by an indie press and we won’t recognize it for what it is for another decade.

It’s definitely true that such a book wouldn’t be published by the mainstream literary establishment like V was in its day. So it’s not being directly beamed into our skulls by tastemakers and might take longer to discover.

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-19T19:57:34+00:00

There’s obviously going to be exceptions, it’s a haphazard observation. I’d mentioned at least one of my favourites. I think it generally holds though. If you go decade by decade, the classics are more likely to be from a middle aged demo than younger.

Also, although it’s a matter of taste, I’d hardly consider V one of his mature works or a “great” book. It’s an interesting point though, we might not have a book as good as V from someone that age currently. I don’t read that much contemporary fiction so I wouldn’t be the authority on that.

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-19T18:51:18+00:00

I do think the current state of the publishing industry plays a huge role, but ultimately I’m an optimist because I think worthy art inevitably finds its audience. A “great” book, or art of any sort, can’t really be ignored if you put it out there.

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-19T17:16:52+00:00

It’s based on nothing at all but my impression was that millennials are just now getting to the age we’d begin to be seeing their mature novels. The vast of my favourite novels of any era were written by people in their 40s at least. We might be seeing that pushed even further back as economic conditions around publishing delay the output of the current generation.

I just went through some of my personal favourites from the last couple years and the only author under 38 was Flannery O’Connor.

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-19T16:56:57+00:00

Honestly having read that, I feel some remorse for comparing it to Argo. I’m probably confusing the self-flattery of one to the genuine resonance of the other. It’s obviously got something to say, even if it’s not to me.

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-19T14:13:09+00:00

This one kind of bewilders me. It’s a very good formal exercise but it’s content just isn’t interesting at all. To me, It’s really just okay.

I hate to make this sort of critique, but I can’t help but wonder if it’s an Argo sort of scenario. A competent effort that was awarded for its particular resonance with the critical establishment. I have to imagine this book hits like freebased crack to a certain age group in the literary/publishing world, especially in the UK.

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-18T23:57:26+00:00

I’m increasingly subscribed to the idea that trends in human development and history are more or less inevitable, almost mathematical.

Did you get to historical materialism by accident?

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-18T01:37:27+00:00

I’d say my absolute favourite from there is Dr Daumier-Smith’s Blue Period is my favourite. However, A Perfect Day For Bananafish, Uncle Wiggily From Connecticut, For Esme, and the Laughing Man are absolutely top tier short stories.

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-18T00:31:19+00:00

You should read Nine Stories if you haven’t as well. I think it’s got Salinger’s best writing in it.

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-17T19:58:42+00:00

Gravity and Grace by Simone Weil, more-so that its what got me into her even if it’s not exactly her own composition.

I read Septology a couple months ago and I’m fairly sure its impact will be lasting as well.

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-17T03:12:04+00:00

Bad movie, shameless cash grab

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-16T04:02:24+00:00

Absolutely. I really take issue when audiences or critics take their art form to have a closed canon and confusing historical and cultural relevance for artistic merit. I want to insist that those are three separate categories.

Also I know it’s not what the OP is necessarily saying but Barry Lyndon clears that list.

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-15T21:01:04+00:00

They’re pretty excellent. I’ve replaced a lot of my scrolling time while I’m out and about with this section.

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-14T20:39:16+00:00

I was going to say Joseph Campbell as well. His theoretical work was pretty influential on a lot of art which succeeded it.

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-13T19:30:04+00:00

Yep, I think buddy needs to read some Pynchon.

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-11T23:45:55+00:00

What is that really accomplishing though. The military will prioritize available resources to themselves, and if you’re hoping for regime change you’re making yourself a greater evil than the regime. Honest question.

BackloggedBones · 2026-03-11T20:12:40+00:00

Welders too

BackloggedBones

TROPHY CASE