Move Under Ground

Rating:
Summary: Ftagn!
Review: "Move Under Ground" by Nick Mamatas tells the story of the last, great adventure of Jack Kerouac, Neal Cassidy, and William S. Burroughs; each of them worn down by life and by their own peculiar addictions, but each still somehow sparking with purpose, with joy. The story takes place in an alternate version of our world, where Cthulu and the other Old Ones have returned to place the world of men firmly under their dominion, subverting the 'squares' who have already sold their souls to the corporate machine. A letter from a friend and words from a visiting Bodhisattva spur Kerouac to make one long, final roadtrip to save the world.

It's written in Kerouac's style, that seductive, joyful cadence that makes your heart beat faster, makes you ache to experience everything as fully the narrator has done. It's that cadence that made me fall in love with a writer who died when I was just a child (as soon as I read "The Dharma Bums").

The ending is bittersweet and slow, a little needle to the heart that made me want to travel north to visit Kerouac's gravesite. Maybe I'll hit one of his favorite bars down here, instead, and buy a pint in his memory. If you love Kerouac, you'll love this.

Rating:
Summary: Catch this rising star
Review: Have you ever picked up a book and within pages said to yourself, "This is unlike anything I've ever read before"? That's the feeling you'll experience with Nick Mamatas's MOVE UNDER GROUND, a road story that finds beat poets journeying across America in a quest defeat the demons of H.P. Lovecraft. It's a simple enough sounding premise, but Mamatas writes his novel as Jack Kerouac, and this novel is as much about K's voice as it is about Lovecraft's monsters. There really has never been anything like this before, and in transcending the genres that he has co-opted here, Mamatas may have created a new one of his own. Reading the publicity material, you might think this is a gimmick; reading the novel, you'll realize that you're participating in the start of something as big as Cthulhu.

Rating:
Summary: More than just a good gimmick
Review: Have you ever thought to yourself, "In a cosmic battle for the future of the world who would win; Jack Kerouac or Chthulu?" OK, you're right, it never even occurred to me either before I heard about Move Under Ground. Which is why it's just about the most preposterously cool premise I've heard for a book in a long time. So of course I had to read it.

Move Under Ground has more going for it than just a good gimmick. Mamatas smoothly overlays the dark, secretive world of H.P. Lovecraft's with the hallucinatory stream-of-conscious commentary of Kerouac at his best to produce one hell of a road trip. The Chthulu world seen through a wasted beat's eyes allows for lavishly horrifying visions. With William Burroughs as Kerouac's sidekick on the ride there are darkly hilarious moments as well.

What really makes this book a treasure is the prose. Move Under Ground is a mine of electric phrases and neon imagery bursting from blackness. But don't try to read this book in the midst of distractions. It requires concentration and imagination to picture everything Mamatas describes.

Rating:
Summary: Too hip for the room?
Review: I bought this book on the recommendation of a friend. We are no longer friends. (Kidding .... but this book was really pretty lame.) It's written in a way that is too self-consciously cool, and unlike an homage to the beat authors it was just derivative. I strongly urge you to check this book out at the library or read excerpts before shelling out the bucks. I sure wish I'd done that.

Rating:
Summary: Wonderful first novel from one of the best new sf writers
Review: I enjoyed the hell out of this book. I've liked just about everything I've read by Nick Mamatas, so it came as no surprise to me how accomplished this novel was. Emotional, moving, and wickedly intelligent. You don't even have to be familiar with Kerouac or the Beats to get into it, so don't let that stop you. Read it now, or you risk becoming a mindless, clacking beetleman.

Rating:
Summary: Ftagn!
Review: I have several complaints about this book.

First, its dimensions are entirely Euclidean. The thing doesn't fit on any of my bookshelves. I've ordered my gibbering servants to get me one from Ikea, but I'm having a heck of a time putting it together.

Second, I don't like the fact that I'm made into a kind of allegory for conformity and the alienating effects of late capitalism on the middle class. I've always thought of myself as either an old hippie or, perhaps, an ancien regime man of leisure. Think about it -- all I do is sleep and dream.

That said, Mamatas effortlessly nails Kerouac's style without limiting himself -- which is great fun. There's eldritch kung-fu a-plenty, and horrible, unforgettable passages that will blast you out of complacency with their blasphemous, marxist terror.

I wish I could write a book but my giant hands crush typewriters.

-Cth.

Rating:
Summary: Read this. Now.
Review: In lesser hands the premise of Jack Kerouac meets Cthulhu would be just that, a premise, a one trick pony with nothing to see. Not the case here. His use of beat voice and Burroughs-like dreamy metaphor is a perfect match to the slimey beasties of Cthulhu. Move Under Ground is clever and funny, but it's also surprisingly sad and human and profound.

Rating:
Summary: Read this. Now.
Review: In lesser hands the premise of Jack Kerouac meets Cthulhu would be just that, a premise, a one trick pony with nothing to see. Not the case here. His use of beat voice and Burroughs-like dreamy metaphor is a perfect match to the slimey beasties of Cthulhu. Move Under Ground is clever and funny, but it's also surprisingly sad and human and profound.