The Normals : A Novel

Rating:
Summary: 10 on the Mohs Scale
Review: A gem of a book. Billy Schine has volunteered to be a "normal" for two weeks at a drug research facility, mainly to escape from the loose and frayed ends of his young life. While there he listens to veterans speak about their past researches and the effects of drugs they've experienced both 3rd- and 1st-hand. These stories become part of the bragadaccio found in former high school athletic glories, sexual escapades, war stories, fishing tales and are so horrific they can't possibly be untrue.

This is just a part of what Gilbert weaves into his story, with brittle prose, slashing humor and fathoms-deep insight. Yes, it does call into question those awful blurby things of isolation, meaning of life, leaving some kind of stamp on the world. But Gilbert goes so far beyond the facile-qualities that are usually found. Each issue, of ethics, connection, family, is played out on so many tiers, with a master's prose and a sage's insight. It bogs down a bit at the end, but that does not detract from the overall pleasures to be gained from this book.

Rating:
Summary: disappointing
Review: Gilbert is a very bright and able writer. I had read the reviews for "The Normals" and liked the premise very much - overeducated New Yorker, up to his eyeballs in debt, decides to get out of town and participate in a risky drug study.

The problem is Gilbert feels compelled to describe everything in copious detail. This gets so bad that it slows down the story. Some of his observations are dead-on and I laughed hard. However, most of the time I felt he was trying too hard.

The ending was terrible and I skimmed the last 40 pages.

I hear good things about "Remote Feed" and will try that next. Gilbert needs to relax and just let the story flow a bit more. Hopefully the next novel he writes will be his "The Russian Debutante's Handbook" or "Motherless Brooklyn." He certainly has the talent.

Rating:
Summary: Horribly, Painfully, Fatally Overwritten
Review: I bought this book without ever having heard of the author, on the basis of the premise alone, which I thought was terrific. I knew I was in trouble on page one, when he referred to a small stack of boxes as a Frankenstein's monster. Uh-oh. A Clever Guy. He knows how to use metaphors, he just doesn't know how to use them well. It only gets worse from there; one can actually watch the author struggle to bend the prose around in order to describe things for which he's thought up clever things to say. Trouble is, the many, many, MANY descriptions, always weighted down with surprisingly terrible metaphors, don't provide any insight, only distractions.

I found myself almost shouting at the book at times; for example, the sentence: "Mirages from earlier times-bakeries and butchers mostly-float between handbag boutiques and restaurants. "Really?" I thought. "The bakeries and butchers FLOAT?" But fine, I'll overlook that one too if we can just get to the plot. Maybe when he has to make the character DO something, he'll stop doing that. I don't know if he ever did get around to writing the actual book or if I quit it with several hundred more pages of leaden adjectives yet to come, but I gave up on page 46. I just couldn't take it. Shame, too. It's such an interesting premise. Somebody should write a book that uses it.


Rating:
Summary: A Great Read
Review: I bought this book, as did others, based only on the premise, having never read the author. I have since added him to my short list of "must read" authors. I have already bought Remote Feed, and will watch for his next novel with anticipation.

The writing is superb. I am definitely a fan of a well-turned metaphor, and Gilbert turns them beautifully. He comes close to entering the same class as the first on my list: Tom Robbins. It is amazing how much interest I had in a novel where very little happens. The writing created a life through the thoughts of the main character, and kept me laughing (often sadly) at each sentence.

This is a must-read novel, and the excellence of the writing is a reminder why I could never be an author.

Rating:
Summary: Unfulfilled potential
Review: I had high hopes for The Normals. I heard great things about it and could not wait to read it. The writing was excellent, and the premise was pretty clever. However, about halfway through, the story started to wane. Initially, Billy comes across as an edgy, smart guy. As the story progresses, he turns out to be more pathetic than anything else, and that's just sort of depressing and not something I really want to read about. It was a shame that the momentum couldn't continue. This book went from being a true page-turner that I hated to put down to something that I didn't want to pick up. I did finish it, but I didn't really want to.

Rating:
Summary: Indulgent
Review: I loved Gilbert's "Remote Feed" and was eager to read this novel, but by pg. 140 I simply couldn't continue. The wise-guy prose, the elaborate language describing nothing, the John Irving "Hotel New Hampshire" madness forced on the proceedings and the most bland, ridiculous characters imaginable -- it's all absurd, silly, unbelievable.

Great novels are about truth. This novel is an empty farce. I see a young and promising author turned vainglorious. While acknowledging that Martin Amis has made this pose a career, I wish Gilbert would try for more.

Rating:
Summary: An intelligent, funny and poignant novel
Review: I thoroughly enjoyed The Normals and recommend it highly. I read it over a recent weekend, and will probably re-read it within the year. Mr. Gilbert is an intelligent and witty writer. Beyond the plot, which is satisfying in itself, the true pleasures for me were Mr. Gilbert's unique voice, adroit observations and gratifying craftsmanship. There seems to be a surprising and original turn of phrase, or an unexpected but-somehow-just-right word choice, on every page. The Normals put me in mind of several of Don DeLillo's novels - Americana, End Zone and Amazons. There are a handful of authors whose next books I await with active, web-surfing eagerness - Don DeLillo, Martin Amis, Kathryn Davis, Cormac McCarthy, John Updike. I am adding Mr. Gilbert to that list.

Rating:
Summary: "The hours of life were emerging from within him"
Review: The Normals didn't grab me at all, and while I can admire author David Gilbert's literary dexterity, I just felt that in this novel there was a distinct lack of focus. It's as though Gilbert is trying to pack so much meaning and place so many themes into the novel, that most readers will probably be exhausted by story's end. In all fairness, however, the novel's embattled, beleaguered protagonist evokes much compassion, and readers will probably find themselves identifying with his plight.

Billy Schine is very much a hero for the 21st century. He's 28 years old, street-smart, college educated, works for a temp agency, but is somewhat of a young urban failure. His relationship with his girlfriend has not been going very well, and he has acquired masses of debt from student loan repayments. It doesn't help that he has next to no relationship with his parents, who are emotionally unavailable to him. They are both trapped in their own self absorbed little world - his Mother is just diagnosed with Alzheimer's and his father can't cope with losing her.

Billy is a fit of desperation decides to escape from the bill collectors by joining a pharmacological test group. He's just received a threatening letter from the collection agency, so he hopes that the money gleaned from this study will give him a fresh start and allow him to pay off his debts. Much of the action of the novel takes place at the headquarters of the company where Billy stays with the other members of the group and is subjected to two weeks of psychoactive drug testing (the experimental drug is designed for schizophrenics). The group's blood is taken everyday and they are closely monitored for side effects.

The drug starts to have strange side effects on Billy and his colleagues: from day one, one character nicknamed Do, never washes, avidly reading the Bible, while becoming obsessed with carrying out anti-social behaviour. Another character called Lannigan, shaves his entire body. There's also a scar-covered man who says he gets his kicks from a "professional traumatist."

The story is pretty much a pieced together a montage of Billy's reactions to the various people who will eventually become part of his group of titular "normals." As he develops a crush on Gretchen, the only female normal (and the only sympathetic character), Billy begins to evaluate his own sorry life. The irony is whether it is the effects of the drug that is causing him to be introspective and pensive, or whether it is just the ramifications of being shut up in such a controlled, restricted environment.

The narrative is peppered with Billy's pessimistic diatribe and is full of social commentary: He muses on the profiteering of corporate drug companies, the viciousness of the media, and constantly references the vacuous influence of pop-culture. Billy's final decision to agree to a second more radical study at the risk of death doesn't come a moment to soon. And his motivations for deciding to partake in this study are also surprisingly unconvincing. Readers will probably enjoy parts of this book, but this reader thought that it came across as almost short story-like - it's just a series of vignettes of Billy's obsessive, and neurotic rifts. Mike Leonard February 05.