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Rating: 
Summary: a lack of seriousness in our culture
Review: And so it has come to this. That paid, supposedly well-read, pundits could compare a puny talent such as Heather Woodbury favorably to James Joyce and Charles Dickens tells us much about the dumbed-down state of arts and letters in America. Her ravers (that is her bought public relations "critics," not her characters) don't seem to have read Joyce or Dickens. They clearly have read many blurbs and ad slogans, however, and they love the sound of words--the more meaningless, empty and hollow, the better they like 'em.Woodbury makes for an engaging stage performer. That's what she is, a reasonably OK stand-up comic. She isn't a writer of any kind, as even a cursory skim through her dreadful book will reveal to any literate person. Woodbury has, as Lorrie Moore might say, a ludicrous notion of plot. Not only ludicrous, but also insulting to the reader and smacking of an unmistakable desperation on the author's part. (At one point, having written her characters into a corner, Woodbury inserts herself into the text. Ugh! Perhaps she and fellow hack Charlie Kaufman ought to collaborate.) I did enjoy the Violet character. Her monologues about jazz are actually vivid and funny. Yet Woodbury manages to cheapen even her one likable character in an unnecessary passage about illegal abortions. Unnecessary not because of the topic, but because the author isn't skilled enough to leap from dry comedy to pathos. And there's something generic about the abortion episode. It's just there to be a horror and a shock, illuminating nothing. The other partially successful characterizations stem from the exchanges between Paul, an Ugly American businessman (and the "novel"'s chief pin cushion) and Skeeter, a West Coast stoner dude. Here, Woodbury does make a compelling case that all men are the same underneath, though their surfaces may vary wildly. (I'm not sure that I agree with her, just that she presents the juxtaposition well enough.) And yes, Woodbury skewers television adroitly, as in her send-up of the exploitation program "Suicide Watch." Such an easy target, though. I would advise you to purchase her book only if you need an object to toss into the fireplace some chilly winter evening. You would at least have the pleasure of watching it burn to a cinder.
Rating: 
Summary: The Living Novel really lives!
Review: Heather Woodbury's book is lively, imaginative, and shockingly good-hearted. As a gathering of performance scripts, it draws the reader into the characters portrayed, to mouth their words and feel the weight of their rhythm and their passion. You have to take Woodbury's place as the actor, and you can smell her presence. I have never seen her perform, but I'll go out of my way to do so now. She likes to mine moments of intimate revelation. She is an exhibitionist whose sympathetic nature values the juicy bits in the human heart that people usually hide as objects of desire or shame. The central characters are two teenaged girl friends and the boy they love, who loves them both. This overly tight triangle causes them to drift away from one another, though their love remains unabated, following paths of their own heart's making. The guidance of school and family fall away. They have become "ravers," buoyed on the waves of Ecstasy and weed, to which they owe allegiance but not addiction. Clove floats northward on a quest to free the "Friendly Ghost Cobain" from its bondage. Skeeter hitchhikes across to the US to NYC for advice on love from his favorite aunt, a high class prostitute, who practices witch craft. Sable remains behind trying to keep in touch with both. The language that they use is remarkable, imaged filled, highly mannered, flowery, but muscular in a way that enables the them to articulate their intentions in delicate, even dangerous situations. It glides easily into poetry with a melody and richness of image flow that highlights the scenes in way reminiscent of Shakespeares in Midsummer Night's Dream. It is addictive. In the preface to the book Woodbury says, after quoting Steinbeck on this matter, that she has "attempted to do [her] part in recording all the particularities of American speech that still hang on." There are many other kinds of characters in this book. Each scene is succeeded by another with a different place, cast, and set of dialects. The characters are recurrent, and after a while, a set of plots begins to emerge. One of these is in strong counterpoint to that of the ravers. Its central character, Bushie, is a down and out whore, doing crack on the streets of Hell's Kitchen. Her scenes are harsh and dark, but they too reflect Woodbury's love of the human heart. The book is like an extra-large gift-box of See's assorted candy.
As you read, you take one bon-bon after another. You like some better than others, but in the end you eat them all with pleasure. This book is that kind of a gift.
Rating:
Summary: The Living Novel really lives!
Review: Heather Woodbury's book is lively, imaginative, and shockingly good-hearted. As a gathering of performance scripts, it draws the reader into the characters portrayed, to mouth their words and feel the weight of their rhythm and their passion. You have to take Woodbury's place as the actor, and you can smell her presence. I have never seen her perform, but I'll go out of my way to do so now. She likes to mine moments of intimate revelation. She is an exhibitionist whose sympathetic nature values the juicy bits in the human heart that people usually hide as objects of desire or shame. The central characters are two teenaged girl friends and the boy they love, who loves them both. This overly tight triangle causes them to drift away from one another, though their love remains unabated, following paths of their own heart's making. The guidance of school and family fall away. They have become "ravers," buoyed on the waves of Ecstasy and weed, to which they owe allegiance but not addiction. Clove floats northward on a quest to free the "Friendly Ghost Cobain" from its bondage. Skeeter hitchhikes across to the US to NYC for advice on love from his favorite aunt, a high class prostitute, who practices witch craft. Sable remains behind trying to keep in touch with both. The language that they use is remarkable, imaged filled, highly mannered, flowery, but muscular in a way that enables the them to articulate their intentions in delicate, even dangerous situations. It glides easily into poetry with a melody and richness of image flow that highlights the scenes in way reminiscent of Shakespeares in Midsummer Night's Dream. It is addictive. In the preface to the book Woodbury says, after quoting Steinbeck on this matter, that she has "attempted to do [her] part in recording all the particularities of American speech that still hang on." There are many other kinds of characters in this book. Each scene is succeeded by another with a different place, cast, and set of dialects. The characters are recurrent, and after a while, a set of plots begins to emerge. One of these is in strong counterpoint to that of the ravers. Its central character, Bushie, is a down and out whore, doing crack on the streets of Hell's Kitchen. Her scenes are harsh and dark, but they too reflect Woodbury's love of the human heart. The book is like an extra-large gift-box of See's assorted candy.
As you read, you take one bon-bon after another. You like some better than others, but in the end you eat them all with pleasure. This book is that kind of a gift.
Rating:
Summary: This book is one of the best I've read all year!
Review: I LOVED this book. It is outrageous, funny,and deeply moving. Woodbury tells the story of a dozen seemingly unrelated characters on both sides of the continent with such realism and feeling that you can't help sharing in their laughter, their tears, and the general splendid weirdness of Whatever.
Rating:
Summary: Brilliant and Hilarious
Review: Phrases from "Whatever" followed me around for weeks after I read it - particularly the mellifluous ravings of Clove... This book brilliantly draws together the far-flung threads of a dozen or so character's lives and knits them into a complex web of interactions. Great social comentary and really funny!
Rating:
Summary: Brilliant and Hilarious
Review: Phrases from "Whatever" followed me around for weeks after I read it - particularly the mellifluous ravings of Clove... This book brilliantly draws together the far-flung threads of a dozen or so character's lives and knits them into a complex web of interactions. Great social comentary and really funny!
Rating:
Summary: RAD!!!!!!!!
Review: WHOOOOOOOOO! Whatever rocks my world! Old Ladies! Corporate dudes! California teenagers on hitchhiking odesseys! Anyone who doesn't like this book is totally lacking a sense of humor! What...ever. Rave on people!
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