Welcome to Litsy!

This book makes me want to send Erickson a thank you note. It is dazzling and true and exhilarating. If your knowledge of 20th century pop culture is solid—and/or you‘re okay with looking up references you‘re pretty sure you don‘t get—and if you‘re on board with slipstream or surreal or whatever tag you want to slap on fiction that knows it‘s about much more than plot, then this book—this experience—is for you. ALL THE ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

“. . . with a tunnel where his heart should be . . .”

This book is flipping brilliant.

I wanted to enjoy this book, but overall I felt like I wasn't smart enough to understand his message. Whether or not that is true, it was an uncomfortable feeling. Erickson uses nice imagery at times, but the flow was disjointed such that it was hard to follow.

#TBRtemptation post 2! The Twin Towers reappear in South Dakota's Badlands 20 years after their collapse. To the tens of thousands who throng to it, they all hear them sing but different songs to each person. On one 93rd floor appears Jesse Presley, dead brother to the famous singer, who is driven mad by a voice in his head. Reviewers call this a heck of a read! #blameLitsy #blameMrBook 😎

This swayed from brilliant, to, I want to dnf. Banana pants concept, but it really works for half the book.Then it lost it for me. A lot of music and historical references that I think I mostly got, (but I‘m sure there was lots lost on me) but wondered how anyone younger would understand any of it. I‘d love to hear a talk by an expert that explains it all too me. Not a pan, I see the brilliance, but not a pick, I hate not being sure I got it.

I think I need this glass of wine to help me understand wtf is going on in this crazy book. One minute I love it, the next I don‘t get it at all. Here hoping the second half explains something. #ToBLonglist

Waiting in the school pick-up line with my #currentread. To quote @vivastory this book is 🍌👖(x1000).

I made it through more than 100 pages but I just can't do it anymore. Reading a character declare that he is "destined for aleatoric hinter-wilds beyond where timbre chokes on the color of its own tone" is just too much for me.

The only way to describe this is ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

I have no idea what I just read.

Road trip!!!! If i could go on the ideal bookish road trip here is where I would go:
1️⃣ Hogwarts. Because Hogwarts.
2️⃣ Rivendell. Because Rivendell.
3️⃣ Bath, because I've always wanted to go to such a place of literary importance ☺️
#24in48 I'm 5 hours in and going strong! Audiobook is done in 3 hours but I have finished my chores so I'm diving in to NDT. How's it going for others?!

Finished this one while camping in the wilderness with 50 of my favorite young people. The storyline was definitely confusing after a break in the middle, but the writing is impeccable.

Deafened earth rolls before the siblings, one horizon of sedition and perfidy following another, strafed by those who most proclaim America's embrace.

I had to bail on this one. Interesting idea but the writing was so choppy and disconnected. And then there's Elvis' twin brother too.

Very good and very different book so far. Definitely a unique idea for a novel

"Sonic sky" "Turin" "Dead-free" "You can't leave 'cause your heart is there" - every page has a chapter, and every chapter title is a quote worth noting.

What Erickson does best, that is, sifts for questions and answers about America through our pop culture, is at peak weirdness. Perhaps frustrating for readers looking for a standard narrative but if you're OK with taking a surreal trip there's a lot to enjoy it.

Couldn't help but think of Scott Walker's fascinating song "Jesse" (2006), which also joined the towers to the Presley twin.

One of his best (my personal fav is Days Between Stations).

Whether he meant it or not, a Bugs Bunny joke will always play well with me, lol 😂📚✨

I remember Zeroville being so compelling but this left me cold

"defiant in its lack of functionality"

This novel that comes out this month has The Badlands, the Twin Towers and Elvis' resurrected twin brother. Jonathan Lethem said it was the best book he read all year. Moving up the TBR. #shadows #feistyfeb

This is strange and surreal and wonderful. I'm betting @Liberty would like it.

This is tough to review as it's unlike anything I've read before. It sort of imagines an America where Elvis's twin was born instead of him, and it also explores American culture and music and how we've been shaped by 9/11. There are so many references to so many 20th century events and people and works which as a pop culture junkie I loved. The writing style took some getting used to, though. #firsttoread

Not sure yet how I feel about the book, but this quote stood out: "as pictures pin the maps of our lives, music marks the calendar."

That's it - no pretense of doing anything else tonight exists - I'm just gonna read this book til my eyes just stop.

Starting this ARC tonight...

Shadowbahn is admittedly not for everyone (Twin Towers unexplainably popping up in the Badlands is a major plot point) but it was most certainly for me.

Surrealist fiction, it's what's for dinner

"Save America from itself" is a bumper sticker I would like to see...