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Guide (George Miles Cycle #4)

3.99 of 5 stars 3.99 · rating details · 388 ratings · 30 reviews

Chris is a young porn star who wants to experience death at someone else's hand; Mason has lurid fantasies about members of British pop bands; Sniffles is a teenage runaway whose need for love outweighs his attachment to life. Courtesy of a frankly manipulative author/narrator named Dennis, these characters and more move through a subterranean Los Angeles where hallucinati...more

Paperback, 192 pages

Published August 6th 1998 by Grove Press (first published 1997)

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Aug 21, 2008 Eugene rated it 5 of 5 stars

after getting through this drug-blurred, blood-oily, post-sex sense-deracinating--i decided that DC is not so much a sadist or even really, fundamentally, a provocateur. that that's not his primary impulse, but rather it's indeed some kind of exploration of the ecstatic--in all its forms. and the ecstasy-explorer is searching out taboo and murder and drug-experience not out of a negative motivation, not for rage or violence against society, but much more basically out of a movement toward the tr...more after getting through this drug-blurred, blood-oily, post-sex sense-deracinating--i decided that DC is not so much a sadist or even really, fundamentally, a provocateur. that that's not his primary impulse, but rather it's indeed some kind of exploration of the ecstatic--in all its forms. and the ecstasy-explorer is searching out taboo and murder and drug-experience not out of a negative motivation, not for rage or violence against society, but much more basically out of a movement toward the transcendent.

or, i wouldn't think of his project as wish-fulfillment and certainly utopian isn't the first adjective that crosses the mind--but that's just what the DC character claims: "Then I remember what I do when I'm not stoned. You know, write novels that are essentially long, involved wishes for offbeat utopian worlds that I can't realistically enter" (65), which might in fact be one way to conceptualize this novel of kiddie-porn snuff films and HIV-infected rent boys and rape of all kinds.

...part of how GUIDE functions as (a kind of) wish fulfillment fiction is by maintaining an aura of non-fiction. (the fantasy is best for the narrator when it seems real / the fantasy is possible for the narrator because it isn't real.) and one very impressive thing about GUIDE is how its subtle structure effectively conflates reportage with fiction. as well, almost lost due to the virtuosic handling of its extreme materials is the sensitivity cooper has for tone-shifts, his beautifully efficient characterization, and the ability for just setting up and moving us almost breezily through his complicated apartment-scapes.

should say too: the feeling while reading it is pretty intense. "edgy" and "risky" seem too corporatized a language to describe it. i finished it maybe twenty minutes ago, and i still feel like it's a little hard to breathe. a gut-punch of a book.

from this interview:

Q: How did you protect the kids?
DC: Well, I used my late, beloved friend George Miles as the model for all the major young male characters in the cycle because he's the one person I would have protected at all costs. I think the way this protection panned out is that when most of the violence happens, the story becomes unrealistic and fantasy-like, as though it might or might not really be happening. Also, the young characters are always the most sympathetic. So I didn't manage to completely protect them, but the books (and I hope my readers) always care about them.

and on method:

Q: Kathy Acker published first drafts of things, wrote at the point of orgasm in order to hit on something true, but you polish and refine. Would you ever go down the automatic, exquisite corpse sort of route?

DC: It wouldn't work, because my first drafts are crap for the most part. I try to let myself go all out at first, then go back and rip apart what I've written then rebuild it, then shred it again, and so on. My real voice isn't exact or careful at all, and I spend much, much more time refining my prose than writing it. On rare occasions, a piece will come out nearly perfect the first time, but almost never.

(less)

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Aug 19, 2010 Eddie Watkins rated it 4 of 5 stars

There's a philosopher's stone at the heart of this novel and it's a petrified lump of shit high up in the ass of a teenage junky. At first this lump is merely an erotic curiosity discovered during deep and relatively innocent digital anal probing, but later it becomes a potential mystical object in the hands of a sadistic dwarf. The "harvesting" of this stone provides the most potent image in the book - The dwarf slowly stabbing a willing boy to death during sex, then slicing around the boy's as...more

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Mar 27, 2012 Angela Roberts rated it 4 of 5 stars

I read Guide in one sitting at the Berkeley Library feeling a little bit guilty, like the library would collapse upon my head if Berkeley's famously tolerant liberal parent population knew what was going on.

Guide is only the third or fourth of my Cooper explorations. It does not invoke the same level of oh-shit what-the-fuck-am-i-reading-omgNO-fist-rape-death-trip inspired panic as Ugly Man, which so far is my favorite for its florid visuals and DC's mastery of short prose form, but it does tou...more

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Mar 09, 2011 Evan rated it 5 of 5 stars

"Déjà vu," Luke muttered. He'd seen Scott reenter the room in that exact way before. Time was he'd have figured such thoughts were just fallout from LSD, DMT, Ecstasy. . . . Now he knew they were magical.

Truth is dry. You'll know the truth when everything in your world seems as if it's been cooked until nothing is left but the exact information that separates it from other things in the world.

I couldn't risk meeting his gaze for some reason. I sort of hate it when things get too obvious.

That's t...more

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Mar 20, 2009 David rated it 1 of 5 stars

I found this book less offensive than just sort of boring and pointless. Cooper tosses around scenes of child pornography, sexual violence, and drugs all over the place, but I can't tell that he has any real self-reflection or insight into himself or the people's he's talking about. On top of that, I really don't like his writing--Genet, Rimbaud, and others Cooper is often compared to not only have a beautiful, original grasp of language, but they have something to say about art and beauty amids...more

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Sep 25, 2011 La Stamberga dei Lettori rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: tancredi

Quarto episodio del Ciclo di George Miles, è probabilmente il più autobiografico dei romanzi di Cooper, fosse solo per il protagonista narrante che dell'autore porta nome e cognome. Con rimandi agli altri romanzi della serie, a cominciare dal primo, si propone come uno dei più caratteristici di Dennis Cooper, ricco di ambivalenti immagini e temi forti: orrore ed innocenza, violenza e tenerezza, con un sottofondo animato fatto di trip psichedelici, pedopornografia, grunge e new wawe, messi lì com...more

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Oct 12, 2010 Brent rated it 5 of 5 stars

The skin on Luke's face was a fog. Scott could see, or almost see, his friend's skull or, more specifically, that curious object which certain historical types labeled "the skull." It was more like a pkhw . . . Words failed Scott. A filament? But weren't words too complex to manipulate properly? Luke, for instance, meant nothing compared to the word "Luke," because it defined a million people named Luke. Or take "love." "Love" was the world's favorite word. But it was also a lie that human being...more

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Oct 28, 2009 Adam rated it 4 of 5 stars

Beautiful, bold, and brilliant. A lot of Cooper's unique and trademark style has been carried over into Guide but with some innovation. For instance, Guide is much more personal, it seems. This episode of the George Miles series is, in my opinion, the best because it brings together the three previous novels and begins to explain who George Miles was to Dennis, why he is so important - how he changed Dennis forever. The novel somehow manages to be touching, heart-breaking, and disgusting all at...more

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Sep 10, 2011 Tancredi rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: statunitensi

La tenerezza dei violenti.

Quarto episodio del Ciclo di George Miles, è probabilmente il più autobiografico dei romanzi di Cooper, fosse solo per il protagonista narrante che dell'autore porta nome e cognome. Con rimandi agli altri romanzi della serie, a cominciare dal primo, si propone come uno dei più caratteristici di Dennis Cooper, ricco di ambivalenti immagini e temi forti: orrore ed innocenza, violenza e tenerezza, con un sottofondo animato fatto di trip psichedelici, pedopornografia, grung...more

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Oct 11, 2008 Larry-bob Roberts added it

Before you call up the FBI and report Dennis Cooper and his kiddie-porn making, drug-taking, rockstar-mickey-slipping, child-killing friends, repeat to yourself "it's only a book."

This is the Wes Craven's "Scream" of Dennis Cooper books, in which people have read his other novels and ask if he's really the serial killer you'd think. Dennis tells the pierced-face poseur kid who asks that just like him, he only decorates himself, but it's on the inside instead.

Like an episode of Seinfeld, there's...more Before you call up the FBI and report Dennis Cooper and his kiddie-porn making, drug-taking, rockstar-mickey-slipping, child-killing friends, repeat to yourself "it's only a book."

This is the Wes Craven's "Scream" of Dennis Cooper books, in which people have read his other novels and ask if he's really the serial killer you'd think. Dennis tells the pierced-face poseur kid who asks that just like him, he only decorates himself, but it's on the inside instead.

Like an episode of Seinfeld, there's no moral lessons in Dennis Cooper's writing -- but perhaps they are present by their negation. To portray someone having safe sex does not make it correct -- likewise writing of a kid getting fucked without a condom doesn't make it good either. Either fiction is equally a lie.

It's because Cooper is a character himself that it's hard to tell yourself that it's only a movie. The actual movie made from Cooper's writing, Frisk, was doomed from the beginning of production by its casting of all-wrong modelly-type gay actors instead of the fucked-up kids that should've inhabited it -- it came off as a staged reading by sophisticated adults instead of an actual production, therefore not believable or disturbing.

Disturbing is what we want from Cooper -- proof that we're not totally jaded, still capable of being shocked. If we read a novel about A-gays we might be disappointed that we could never be as successful as them, but this way we'll always be morally superior to these conscienceless monsters.

The name of one character, Mason, is only a little off of Manson. He's sort of Dennis' worse half, the older artist who does actually slip a mickey (or more precisely, a roofie) to a rock star and molests him while he's passed out.

If you were confronted in real life by a kid kept by child pornographers the dilemma would be to turn in your pals or not, to wonder if the kid would end up more fucked by the legal/juvenile home system than by the situation he was in. As far as I can tell, nobody in this book judges anyone else as depraved or even considers putting an end to their sick fun. Maybe it's that they all know they're fucked up enough to kill someone.(less)

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Jun 11, 2008 Gary Lee rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: gayish-lit, artsy-fartsy, literatti

Of the five Cooper novels I've read (Safe, plus 4/5 of the 'George Miles cycle'), this one is, by far, my favorite. Everything I found to be lacking in Try seems to be placed back in with Guide.
Every book in this progression has found an author becoming more confident in his voice and in his art; Try was certainly no exception, I just felt there to be some faint form of disconnect overall. However, Guide seems to be Cooper at the height of his game.
With this novel Cooper blurs the line between...more

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Oct 23, 2009 Joe rated it 2 of 5 stars

I'm all for exorcising personal demons through writing. Heck, I've done it myself. However some demons are best exorcised privately for the exorcist's eyes only.

Such is the case with Dennis Cooper's work and such is the case with Guide.

If you're not familiar with Cooper or his work let me clue you in. Cooper is admittedly a very, very fucked up man. Some fucked up things happened to him as a kid and even more fucked things happened when he lived in Amsterdam. So much so, that Cooper has a person...more

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Jun 02, 2009 M. rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: 2007, own, 2009, second-reading, fiction

I think this is probably my least favorite of the cycle, though it still being Cooper, I still like it more than a lot of other author's work. The insistence on the incorporation of the lyrics from music that's playing strikes me as a bit annoying, as I don't ever really feel like indie rock lyrics, especially those rattled out in the ironic voice of Robert Pollard, really hit at the emotion that this book was presenting (though I should clarify that GBV is one of my favorite bands, so it's not...more I think this is probably my least favorite of the cycle, though it still being Cooper, I still like it more than a lot of other author's work. The insistence on the incorporation of the lyrics from music that's playing strikes me as a bit annoying, as I don't ever really feel like indie rock lyrics, especially those rattled out in the ironic voice of Robert Pollard, really hit at the emotion that this book was presenting (though I should clarify that GBV is one of my favorite bands, so it's not that I don't like the lyrics).

There's also a sort of defeated nastiness here that I think is absent from the other books, despite how many not-entirely-invested readers are quick to accuse the evilness of. Both Frisk and this work seem to deal with the issue of representation, and while it's more on the surface here, I think it works a lot better in Frisk.

This is the only book in the cycle that takes, exclusively, the narrative pov of the "predators" so to speak (while it's all from narrator-Dennis-godlike point of view that is). In the rest of the cycle, I suppose excluding Frisk, the point of view is primarily that of the hunted instead of the hunter. This feels a lot more predatory, and I would say intentionally so, but in a way that makes it sort of uncomfortable, and not just in the level of uncomfortability that the subject manner brings. Somehow, Dennis throwing character-Dennis' ideology through the abstracted pseudo-language of LSD also weakens it. It makes it less sincere. When 15 year old Ziggy is fucked up on drugs and trying to understand drugs in stilted and fragmented language, it's a lot more sincere than 30-or-40-something Dennis doing the same thing. Character Dennis has already been in Ziggy's place.

Though I have to admit that the (semi-)straight up autobiographia with George that pops up near the end of the book is used brilliantly, especially because it conflicts the voice of character-Dennis even more.

------

Okay, having just been clued into the fact that half of the "article for SPIN" in Guide was actually part of an article that the real Dennis Cooper wrote for SPIN magazine, I pulled my copy of All Ears off my shelf (for some reason the only Cooper book that I haven't read yet... guess I'll do that tomorrow, apparently I just always forget that it exists), and read the original article. The different contexts color it in totally different ways, but also sort of serve to highlight how incredibly-fucking-meta Guide is. I think it's probably a lot more technically accomplished than the former three books in the cycle, but it's just the narrative itself that I don't like as much. It's a brilliant experiment, and I think people that dismiss Cooper as a "flat" writer are totally missing out on what his texts are actually doing, but whatever.(less)

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Sep 03, 2009 Josh rated it 1 of 5 stars

Happened upon this book in the library reshelving and thought I'd revisit a controversial author I used to admire. I now firmly believe he should be burned at the stake... I quit reading this after about 30 pages. If you think child pornography and the sexual murder of drug-addicted teens for entertainment is appropriate reading material, for ANYONE, then help yourself to this trash. What was I ever thinking?

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Nov 22, 2011 Stacy rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: read-in-2011, library-book

Mr. Cooper has a gift of making extremely controversial and uncomfortable subject matter compulsively readable. His books are obviously not for everybody, but his genius isn't hard to see if you can stomach the contents.
This is brave and important writing.

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Feb 07, 2012 John Rimbaud rated it 4 of 5 stars

This book is a remarkable account of several lost teenagers living in the LA area with the main character telling the story, which is the author. It has many scenes describing homosexual activity, rape, murder, snuff flim making, etc...The basic elements for nihilism on the West Coast. It's a good read for those who have a strong stomach and enjoy homoerotic text. Far more darker and intelligent than most books out there.

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May 31, 2009 Jacob Dougherty rated it 5 of 5 stars

Great novel about the struggle between what we want to do and what we actually do. There's some great wordplay and style in here too.

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Mar 23, 2013 Gwegowy Conger added it

Greatest example of metafiction, brilliantly crafted, says more about my own soul in 215 pages than victor hugo in all his life.

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Dec 14, 2010 Jamie rated it 1 of 5 stars

Maybe it was just the frame of mind I was in when I read this....I hated it.

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Aug 12, 2012 Susan rated it 5 of 5 stars

Probably the best book I have ever read

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May 13, 2011 Kit rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: recentlyread

Better than Try, not as good as Frisk.

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Feb 01, 2008 Jenny rated it 4 of 5 stars

Recommended to Jenny by: Duval Rodrigues

Shelves: fiction

fantastic, supergross and sexually horrific. cooper's a compelling writer, kept me glued, no matter how terrific or nauseous the scene, plus the GBV & pavement lyrics all over the place make it so 90s, the transcendence in the absolute creepfest make it so timelessy. totally jean genet's our lady of the flowers vibes.

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Oct 28, 2008 joshua caleb rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: forfunself-improvement

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

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May 08, 2009 Guy rated it 3 of 5 stars

Beetje ingetogener dan Closer en Frisk, al heeft dat niets te betekenen. Drugs, nihilisme, seks, rock-’n-roll en geweld à volonté, met een bijzondere bijrol voor de bassist van Blur. (***)

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Feb 13, 2007 Ryan rated it 1 of 5 stars · review of another edition

"Hey everyone! I'm Dennis Cooper. Look at all these f**ked up things I can think of." I hated almost every word of this book.

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Jan 26, 2008 Bek rated it 2 of 5 stars

Grossed me out, had to stop reading it a few times. Felt as if he was straining be nasty as possible.

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Jun 27, 2008 Daniel Gillespie rated it 5 of 5 stars

My favorite Dennis Cooper book. Features unspeakable crimes committed against the bassist from Blur.

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Oct 22, 2008 3z13 rated it 5 of 5 stars

best book by Dennis Cooper hands down. God Jr is the only book to come as close...

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Feb 18, 2010 Amanda rated it 1 of 5 stars

This book was boring and sadistic at the same time. Kind of like that joke, "The Aristocrats." A lot of shock value, not a lot of substance. It's almost as if DC tried to include the sickest stuff his mind could come up with. If you enjoy reading about shocking, sadistic stuff and don't need a plot, this book is for you.

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May 21, 2013 Spencer Distraction rated it 3 of 5 stars

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About Dennis Cooper

Dennis Cooper was born on January 10, 1953 and grew up in the Southern California cities of Covina and Arcadia. In 1976, he founded Little Caesar Magazine and Press, which he ran until 1982. In 1985, he moved to Amsterdam for two and a half years, where he began his ten year long project, The George Miles Cycle, an interconnected sequence of five novels that includes Closer, Frisk, Try, Guide, and...more

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Guide (George Miles Cycle #4)

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