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STANDARD DEVIATIONS

Name: STANDARD DEVIATIONS
Author: Karl Taro Greenfeld
ISBN: 0-375-50276-9

GROWING UP AND COMING DOWN IN THE NEW ASIA

by Karl Taro Greenfeld ‧ RELEASE DATE: July 9, 2002

An exhausting journey through one man’s ego as all the drugs and girls in Asia gradually wear him out.

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The deputy editor of Time Asia takes an erratic tour from Tokyo to Kathmandu, following beautiful Westerners as they snort, smoke, and screw their way around various underworlds.

Although Greenfeld (Speed Tribes, 1994) tells tales of Russian pimps, Chinese princesses, and Thai prostitutes along the way, he firmly remains the protagonist in all but one of a series of narratives loosely stitched together to follow his years spent in Asia. Starting out as an English teacher in his mother’s native Japan, Greenfeld quickly ditches that uncool profession (mid-semester) in favor of the more glamorous world of journalism. His initial enthusiasm for the traveler scene is expressed with much repetition of the F-word and a bizarre adoption of British slang (“lad,” “posh,” “fellow”). Perhaps, through self-deprecation—he describes his jealousy of others who are more successful, beautiful, and hip—he is trying to convey cynicism. It doesn’t work and is more irritating than effective. Greenfeld bolsters his claim to know fashion with an endless litany of characters described by the labels on their jeans and sunglasses. Girls are either hags with TOEFL tapes, or sexual conquests, in which case we are taken through their precise proportions and proficiency at oral sex. Occasionally, a bit of journalism finds its way in and we learn about riots in Jakarta or fads in the Thai sex trade. Only in the last few stories, the best of which is “The Circuit,” do we see our callow hero disillusioned. This doesn’t necessarily make the earlier chapters easier to read, but it’s gratifying to find him irritated with carbon copies of his younger self and a relief to see him finally, as promised, “coming down.”

An exhausting journey through one man’s ego as all the drugs and girls in Asia gradually wear him out.

Pub Date: July 9, 2002

ISBN: 0-375-50276-9

Page Count: 272

Publisher: Villard

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 2002

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
TRUE
by Karl Taro Greenfeld

- BOOK REVIEW
THE SUBPRIMES
by Karl Taro Greenfeld

- BOOK REVIEW
DR. J
by Julius Erving Karl Taro Greenfeld

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NUTCRACKER

by E.T.A. Hoffmann ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 28, 1996

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This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)

Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996

ISBN: 0-15-100227-4

Page Count: 136

Publisher: Harcourt

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER AND THE MOUSE KING
by E.T.A. Hoffmann ; adapted by Natalie Andrewson ; illustrated by Natalie Andrewson

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER
by E.T.A. Hoffmann & illustrated by Julie Paschkis

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TO THE ONE I LOVE THE BEST

EPISODES FROM THE LIFE OF LADY MENDL (ELSIE DE WOLFE)

by Ludwig Bemelmans ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 1955

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An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.