Remainder

published	2007 by Vintage
binding	Paperback
isbn	0307278352 (isbn13: 9780307278357)
pages	320
description	A man is severely injured in a mysterious accident, receives an outrageous sum in legal compensation, and has no idea what to do with it. Then, one...more [close] A man is severely injured in a mysterious accident, receives an outrageous sum in legal compensation, and has no idea what to do with it. Then, one night, an ordinary sight sets off a series of bizarre visions he can’t quite place. How he goes about bringing his visions to life–and what happens afterward–makes for one of the most riveting, complex, and unusual novels in recent memory. Remainder is about the secret world each of us harbors within, and what might happen if we were granted the power to make it real. [close]
date added	02-14-07 edit book

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Angie rated it:

01/22/08

Read in October, 2007

recommended to Angie by: a very mean ad in "the new yorker"
recommends it for: nihilists, freshman/sophomore philosophy majors

this book caused me pain. honest, physical pain, primarily in my neck and shoulders, but also a little bit in my left eyeball, where i believe some cellular degradation and apoptosis took place, and also diffusely and bilaterally in the temporomandibular region. it also induced some psychological and existential suffering, and i believe that this was more the author's aim. that being said, mccarthy comes across as the kind of writer who wouldn't be sad to hear that there were negative physical s...more this book caused me pain. honest, physical pain, primarily in my neck and shoulders, but also a little bit in my left eyeball, where i believe some cellular degradation and apoptosis took place, and also diffusely and bilaterally in the temporomandibular region. it also induced some psychological and existential suffering, and i believe that this was more the author's aim. that being said, mccarthy comes across as the kind of writer who wouldn't be sad to hear that there were negative physical sequelae associated with reading his novel all the way to the end. sometimes the side effects can't be helped. sometimes they are even a necessary part of the reading experience.

sorry, mccarthy, but this was not one of those times. you wounded me for nothing. thanks. jerk.

plot rundown: a presumably average bloke with average friends and average lady troubles is struck by falling debris of unknown (and legally nondisclosable) origin. he lapses into a coma and awakes with some severe motor deficits--specifically, he can't remember how to move. anything. at all. he relearns eventually but is only able to animate his various body parts by thinking very specifically about what and how he would like to move, and he can't escape the feeling that his new motion is somehow less than "actual" motion. having to think about every move before he undertakes it leaves him distanced from his own body, forced to watch it and instruct it and dictate to it like an off-screen director, rather than simply exist within it like he imagines most people do. this necessary scripting and conscious control of all of his actions makes the narrator feel conspicuously "inauthentic," and the more he considers his circumstances, the more certain he is that inauthenticity has been his default state for most of his life. this troubles him immensely, and he devotes himself to pinpointing a time and place in which he was entirely authentic and then synthetically replicating the movement and surroundings, believing that if he can precisely fabricate or mimic authenticity and then prolong the moment of it, he will be able to memorize it and retrain himself to attain it without deliberation.

i assume that we all see how this is a flawed supposition. i imagine that many of you might even roll your eyes a bit at the cartoonish magnitude of the flaw. this is not the thing that causes the pain. the pain is caused by the narrator's manic and escalating pursuit of fabricated authenticity coupled with his and all supporting characters' failure to note the flaw. this is how allegory works, perhaps? only the divine overseer (i.e., tom mccarthy, me, you if you have read the book) has full awareness of the foolishness and futility of the players' desperate little dance, and in that way he or she gets to feel superior while recognizing something that the characters never see?

i don't know. if that were all there was to it, this book could have ended at least a hundred pages before it did. mccarthy was after something bigger. he was trying to do something, to us, really do something. and i thought i knew what, and then i realized that was wrong but thought of something else that might be it, and . . . no, that wasn't it, but it's probably--no. crap. oh, i know! i know, it's--

and then the book ended, and it wasn't that last thing, either, and i was left alone, angry and bewildered, with my pain. my very authentic pain. why have you done this, tom mccarthy? i wondered. why have you written this story full of blatantly misguided actions that no one perceives or corrects, with this ending that teaches me nothing and gives me no hope? all of the sidetracks and seemingly pertinent but ultimately irrelevant details, all of the build-ups that come to naught, why?

and then i knew why. and i thought, oh, aren't you clever, you microcosm-crafting pedant. aren't you precious. can't you follow the trail of knots and pinched nerves in my sad little spine, the one that you've induced with your hypercrafted philosophy seminar, down to its grand conclusion and kiss my authentic ass.

three stars, though. mccarthy knows how to craft a sentence and a scene, and i would never become invested enough in a meritless piece of writing to get this angry about it. i haven't read his short stories, but i probably will, because he does have talent (even if he occasionally inflates or abuses it), and because i am not the sort to hold a grudge. also, i imagine they're better than remainder. the transition from short story to novel can be difficult for the best writer, and ideas aren't always equally suited to both mediums. remainder might have been a blistering short story, and mccarthy's next idea might make for a genius novel. i am not too sore to offer him the benefit of the doubt. but if the next book has the same effect on my jaw, i may not be too magnanimous to send him my dental bill. ...less

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