An Object of (Phenomenal) Beauty

An Object of Beauty by Steve Martin

This seems to have been my year of resistance toward certain books—I've held back on letting myself fall for books more often than I care to recall. It's been some combination, always, that's kept me from reading something: it's because I've read a bunch about how great the book is which, therefore (of course, because I'm an idiot), makes me uninterested, or it's a faulty understanding of what the book's actually about, or it's because I've decided, for some reason, to become inured and stupidly dismissive of the book's author. This has happened over and over, and, honestly, it doesn't bode well for my readerly future (I assume it'll pass: maybe I'm just in a real prickish phase of my literary life).

Chalk this latest avoidance up to reason #3, though in this case it's complicated: I believed I wasn't interested in Steve Martin as a writer because, honestly, his post-op face creeps me out at this point, and because I think his shit can be insufferably precious (that might be a stretch, too: Shopgirl happened to feature an actor I loathe, and so I haven't dug the thing; had someone I enjoy watching replaced the actor I hate seeing, it could've been a hugely good movie, for me [though still there's be Martin's face to contend with]). Anyway, this writing here now is getting insufferable: I avoided Steve Martin's work for all sorts of reasons.[image error]

But here's what's up: Steve Martin's An Object of Beauty might be one of the most satisfying, natural-feeling novels I've read this year. This has, let's all acknowledge, been a great year for fiction: Franzen's came out, plus there was Skippy Dies, to say nothing of One Hour of Television and The Room and the Chair and the new Nelson and Yamashita's I Hotel and and and…anyway: chalk Martin's Object up there, at least top-10, and, if yr feeling generous, maybe even top-5. I'd go that far.

So why? Why's the book so worth yr time and dollars? First, Object is a told story: it's in first person, and we're given the story by a man named Daniel Chest French Franks. Here's what's odd: maybe it's because I'm too versed in post-modern trickery or whatever, but fundamentally told stories/books, those in which some voice seems narrating things instead of the story simply, third-personly being given, are tricky—I'm likely as not to not believe them. Because (I'm not alone, right?) I've had too many experiences with those voices which end in…well, post-modern trickery, in moments where the voice turns to me, acknowledges what's just happened, played with me. Yes? And so now I feel like voices which don't acknowledge the trick of post-modernism are, somehow, cheaper maybe? Fuddy duddy? Something. Yet Martin's Object's voice is fantastic: Daniel's a fantastic character, and his mildly arch dialect and tone is great, grounding and gorgeous, page after page.

Of course, Daniel's language may have something to do with how you get sucked into the story, but Object's beating, sexy and wildly riveting heart is Lacey Yeager, who Daniel meets at college at Davidson, and who, over two decades (roughly: 90′s through the first decade of 2000), is something of a comer in the New York art world. Here's a question I couldn't possibly answer: would Object of Beauty be riveting to someone uninterested in the New York art world? Here's the best I could say to that: though it's Object's milleu, New York, the art world, all of it is simply rich and evocative and good dressing for a very very very good story, and the story is summed in these words form page 16 of my copy of the book: "She started converting objects of beauty into objects of value."

Think of that sentence as an engine: that notion, the relationship between beauty and value, drives the entire book. Here's what's most compellingly fascinating, though: Object of Beauty reads, all the way through, as a terrifically accurate sketch of the art world and sales and everything, but the reader finds out, quite literally on the last page, that there's a whole other story that's been happening underneath the whole time. How to explain this…you know how, in a good meal, the wine may bring out flavors in the main course you may not've tasted otherwise? There's a complementariness at work, one which is fundamentally revealing as well? The wine never makes something taste one way or another, it simply opens things up, allows the taster to realize it was there always? That's how Object finishes: with a taste that suddenly makes the reader aware (and I'll add: gratefully, rapturously aware) of the story that was murmuring beneath the whole time. I'm not sure what's more expertly executed: the skull-clutchingly subtle layering of story beneath story, or the holy-shit spark of connection at book's end. I know I still probably won't watch a ton of Martin movies, mostly because of that face. I know, however, I'll read absolutely anything the man writes. This book's gold.