Blurred Line

Of all the protagonists I've come across, Money's John Self is quite possibly the most loathsome of them all. This novel by Martin Amis follows Self, who's about to direct his first major motion picture. He's busy schmoozing with the biggest stars and getting them ready to star in his film. The problem with John is that he's always drunk and never very nice. By "never very nice", I mean that he's the kind of guy everyone would like to punch in the face at some point - he's always looking for a fight, rude to the extreme to everyone who's not rich and male, and he's constantly having sex with every woman who'll sink low enough to get into bed with him. And, when no one will have sex with him, he doesn't mind trying the rape angle. I mean, the guy is a complete and utter bastard. And this is where Amis shines. Aside from all the other brilliant things he accomplishes in the novel, the most impressive is this: despite everything, you want everything to turn out alright for John Self in the end. This is because, at the very core of John Self there is a kernel of good.

This brings up the theme of the novel. The reason you've got to root for John is because it's made very clear that what's behind all of this evil in him is money. Money is all about the power money has to corrupt and we all want to see morality triumph over commerce. However, instead of writing some terribly sober account of the bad things money can do, Amis has constructed a pitch-perfect black comedy about bad things happening to bad people (and bad things happening to good people, for that matter). This one is an absolute must-read.


Profile Editor. Writer. 9-5er. Lord of the Dance. Blurredline.com Apodis Publishing Fusion Fragment cterrill(at)blurredline.com Buy Goodbye, Darwin Amazon.com Amazon.ca Chapters.ca Barnes&Noble.com Read it free in PDF Format Buy Blurred Line Amazon.com Amazon.ca Chapters.ca Barnes&Noble.com Read it free in PDF Format The Short Stuff "Learning Magic From Mint" - published May 2007 in Atomjack "Between Eternities" - published October 2005 at Speculative.ca "Smoke and Mirrors" - published June 2005 in Byzarium Submissions Log Total Subs: 25 Acceptances: 3 Rejections: 17 Withdrawals: 3 Subs Out: 2 Quality Blogs Scalzi's Whatever Dave's Blogography Bookslut The Struggling Writer SF Signal the0phrastus Paperback Writer Scribe's Writing Desk Nathan Bransford Lyons Literary LLC The World in the Satin Bag Book In The Oven The Word Perhaps We Learned Something... Words, etc. Archives March 2005 April 2005 May 2005 June 2005 July 2005 August 2005 September 2005 October 2005 November 2005 December 2005 January 2006 February 2006 March 2006 April 2006 May 2006 June 2006 July 2006 August 2006 September 2006 October 2006 November 2006 December 2006 January 2007 February 2007 March 2007 April 2007 May 2007 June 2007 July 2007 August 2007 September 2007 October 2007 November 2007 November 2008 December 2008 January 2009 February 2009 March 2009 Et Cetera Cavan @ Last.fm Cavan @ LibraryThing Feeds Atom Feed RSS Feed	Thursday, June 08, 2006 - Money Of all the protagonists I've come across, Money's John Self is quite possibly the most loathsome of them all. This novel by Martin Amis follows Self, who's about to direct his first major motion picture. He's busy schmoozing with the biggest stars and getting them ready to star in his film. The problem with John is that he's always drunk and never very nice. By "never very nice", I mean that he's the kind of guy everyone would like to punch in the face at some point - he's always looking for a fight, rude to the extreme to everyone who's not rich and male, and he's constantly having sex with every woman who'll sink low enough to get into bed with him. And, when no one will have sex with him, he doesn't mind trying the rape angle. I mean, the guy is a complete and utter bastard. And this is where Amis shines. Aside from all the other brilliant things he accomplishes in the novel, the most impressive is this: despite everything, you want everything to turn out alright for John Self in the end. This is because, at the very core of John Self there is a kernel of good. This brings up the theme of the novel. The reason you've got to root for John is because it's made very clear that what's behind all of this evil in him is money. Money is all about the power money has to corrupt and we all want to see morality triumph over commerce. However, instead of writing some terribly sober account of the bad things money can do, Amis has constructed a pitch-perfect black comedy about bad things happening to bad people (and bad things happening to good people, for that matter). This one is an absolute must-read. Cavan blogged at 10:43 PM \| 0 comments	Progress Zilch! 0/0 Listening A.J. Croce - "Maybe I'm Amazed" My Music Reading Bright Lights, Big City - Jay McInerney My Library Watching Black Book: B Sweet and Lowdown: C Breakfast on Pluto: B Wishlist Bridge of Sighs - Richard Russo Rachael Yamagata - Elephants...Teeth Sinking Into Heart