6 Sick Hipsters

by Rayo Casablanca

In this hilarious, frenetic, adrenalin-charged debut, Rayo Casablanca does for modern day Williamsburg, Brooklyn, what Bret Easton Ellis's Less than Zero did for '80s L.A.--but with a knowing grin and a far cooler soundtrack...

Williamsburg, Brooklyn, is the center of the hipster universe, and the members of the Whole Sick Crew are its shining stars. The gang includes Wolfgang, a heavy metal musician and high school guidance counselor who supplies coke to his charges; Rad, a doctor obsessed with obscure new wave songs who has a bad habit of cutting himself when he's stressed; Beth Ann, the neighborhood's queen knitter who's slowly going blind and Harrison, a museum curator moonlighting as a writer of highly prized porn. Collectively, they're the arbiters of taste for every vinyl-loving, Gap-spurning, thrift store regular in town. But lately someone has been laying waste to Brooklyn's uber-hipsters, dispatching them in gruesome fashion.

The cops are dragging their heels, but the Whole Sick Crew knows that a serial killer dubbed Doctor Jeep is responsible. They have a plan to stop him and it's about to go spectacularly awry. Before the week is over, they'll be up to their skinny-jeaned waists in mayhem, manipulation, contract killers, raw sewage, and murderous monkeys. Something is rotten in the state of Billyburg, and the last hipsters standing will discover just how rotten it really is...

Genres: Fiction

280 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 2008

Reviews

[Bethany · Rating 1 out of 5]

Over the top, terribly cliche (especially given how hip it's supposed to be), gratuitous and ineffectual violence. I could not have cared less about ANY of the characters. I found it a completely unbelievable plot. If the pretention was intentional, it was poorly done. What a waste of $15 and my reading time. But it was definitely an experience.

[Bsampson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting. The book illuminated the fatality of consumerism, capitalism,fads and all that jazz. His writing was pure poetry. The book was a wonderful pain. If you have outlandish thoughts about monkeys colonizing mars, this book is for you!

[Alex · Rating 3 out of 5]

'tis a hard boiled cartoon, and like most good cartoons, there's more depth to it than smug self references. What did Bugs Bunny teach you about the world?

[Wendy · Rating 4 out of 5]

The author sent this book to my husband to read and review on his culture website www.skullcull.wordpress.com -- He read it, reviewed it, and I put it on my to-read shelf on Good Reads.

I'm a commuter, which was pretty sucky considering it takes about 3 hours off your free time. A friend of mine turned me on to the fact that I have 3 kids and a husband at home and a full time job, and to look at the commute as "free time" and to bring a book.

I had just been sleeping before. But I decided to bring a book finally, and this is the one I chose. I figured it would take me a week or so, considering it is pretty thick.

Took me two days! I loved this book. It isn't for everyone, as you might have noticed by some of the bitchy reviews.

Let me tell you who this book is for:

comic book geeks, science nerds, hipsters, bill gates-ish nerds who grow up to be millionaires, hackers, slackers, poets, writers, cutters, gutter sluts, strippers, and people who know everything about at least one thing

the sex was good, the violence was great, the comedy was tongue in cheek, this was dark and brilliant.

i don't care what the fluffs say below, they're losers

[Zach · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have an old, well-worn daydream in which I win big bucks on a quiz show where all the questions are about 4ad records. This book features a scene where a musician cheats death by knowing both of Bernard Sumner's other last names, thereby surviving a postpunk trivia quiz administered by a serial killer. Sold.

3.5 stars, really. (My normal policy is to round down, but the author's an old friend of mine. So there.)

[The Plastic Sturgeon · Rating 1 out of 5]

A waste of time.

[Jen · Rating 3 out of 5]

I think this book could have been really good. The premise is hilarious: a serial killer is bumping off hipsters. The hipsters are awesomely over the top - my favorite is Beth Ann, a feminist with a Chelsea haircut (in her case, bald except for bangs and side ringlets) who teaches a senior knitting class called Bitch Knit. She decides to blow the lid off of Coco Chanel holing up with a Nazi lover during WWII by knitting a sweater that says "Coco Chanel" with swasticas in the "o"s to make a statement, blow the lid off the scandal (when she wears it around New York, no one bats an eye - they're hard to shock).

But this is a guy-heavy story that devolves into a thriller about halfway through and doesn't quite work. The author obviously knows plenty about obscure music trivia and whatnot but that doesn't translate into good writing (though the palentologist's porn isn't bad!). And the gore was kind of a turn off, but then, I'm not edgy enough to like that shit. The reveal at the end was intriguing (and hilariously over the top) but didn't bring it home.

This sounds overly harsh. There are some nice turns of phrase:

"His face a tangled black melanoma of fury."

And funny (pov of comic book store guy):

"And he worried that the man holding the gun could read his thoughts. It was a ridiculous idea but in his trembling panic he imagined his thoughts were appearing in white comic book bubbles over his head. He tested the theory: Just shoot me, cocksucker.

Nothing happened.

Paul thought, Okay.

Nothing happened.

Paul spoke. 'Okay...'"

And this assessment of hipsters by a gangster:

"You think that you shine brighter than every other cracker in this world and you've got enough pity for the black man to steal his hip. You catch my drift, right? I'm not interested in breaking down your fantasy world of cooler than this, cooler than that, but I will tell you all I don't believe in any of it. You can eat all the brown fucking rice you want and wear the fucking faggot ass girl's jeans, but you haven't convinced anyone but yourselves that you're important."

[Kerry · Rating 1 out of 5]

Mostly this book just pissed me off. The plot was fairly ridiculous, the characters were unsympathetic, and there is NOBODY I know from Brooklyn who calls Williamsburg "Billburg", or "Billyburg". Really. It wasn't terrlibly written, but I wonder why it was written at all, except to serve as some sort of inside joke for Mr. Casablanca and his friends. And I wonder if Mr. Casablanca is actually a "hipster", or if he just wishes he could have sat at their table in his high school cafeteria.

Basically, this book is just like most supposed "hipsters": not nearly as hip, intelligent, or amusing as it thinks it is....

[Jen Dent · Rating 2 out of 5]

Good quick plane read. Funny since we'd been in Brooklyn for the week prior. Hipsterdom naturally alive and well. Interesting culture references abound, but it just seemed very sped up, not well paced, like it needed maybe another edit to be much stronger. Not to say I didn't like it, I liked some of the characters very much, they just seemed like "X Person likes this" and not much else and so as the sh*t hit the fan I had a hard time caring if even main characters lives were threatened. Oh well.

[Noah · Rating 3 out of 5]

File under "beach reading" or "get excited for your trip to NYC reading" and go into it with a good attitude. Casablanca provides some great characters, some snippets of snappy Tom Robbins-esque theology and loads of obscure pop culture references that give the reader a chance on every page to feel all the more hip just for knowing the reference. The only two speed bumps to my enjoying this book more were the over-employment of profanity and the related issue of dialogue that would sound fine if I were watching it but for reading sounded contrived.

[Chiara · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sucks you in and spits you out with a headful of WTF just happened? Laughed out loud--the image of a savage baboon named Faggot was too funny. The premise? A fashionable serial killer picks off prominent characters among the hipster scenes. There's a fist full of cult classic films, music aficionados and trivia, and cooler-than-thou punks. Loved the immense amount of info packed in, liked the nostalgic undertones but had a hard time finishing the book for some reason.

[Douglas Castagna · Rating 2 out of 5]

Someone is killing hipsters? Awesome! At least that is what I thought, it sounded like an interesting premise that carries through for about roughly two thirds of the book, then it gets weird and totally screws up any sense of realism that the book may have had. There is a conspiracy like plot that comes from out of nowhere that really hurts any credibility the author had in my opinion. It makes reading until the end painful and I was left wondering WTF was this all about.

[Irene · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was so bad. I gave it 2 stars (one 2 more than it deserves) because I actually read it. One stars are only given to those books that I don't finish.

I could have written better narrative in the 9th Grade. In fact, I think I did. I better not get into it here because that will leave me more to talk about at book club.

** I'm actually taking one star back** Yes, it was THAT bad.

[Jocardo · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting yet a bit odd. Dead on with the description (and attitude) of hipsters and Billyburg! The sometimes I was confused by what was going on and at other times I didn't care what was going on but I would push through just to see what happened next. Overall, I liked the book but was disappointed with the ending.

[Marie · Rating 2 out of 5]

It's OK. I don't want to discourage you from reading it. There are many enjoyable parts, and if you like thrillers and murder mysteries, you will probably like this book. And there are some great supporting characters. I wish some more things were tied together.

[James · Rating 3 out of 5]

I loved the first half of this book, but I found the second half completely unbelievable. The author tried too hard to be original and suspension of disbelief was impossible. The book is well-written and entertaining, though, and I hope these problems would be fixed in a second novel.

[Alyssa · Rating 2 out of 5]

It started out strong but once the plot was revealed it got weak. Nice to know that Portland isn't the only place swarming with hipsters - the good people of Brooklyn have to deal with them too apparently!

[William · Rating 1 out of 5]

Rather hard to follow and even understand. Very edgy in ways that I did not admire. I finished it but felt I wasted my time. As the title hints the story is about hipsters that are really really sick in a mental way. Lots of meaningless bloodshed and a very dubious plot at best.

[Jeanie · Rating 2 out of 5]

i was torn between two and three stars for this book and i'm still making up my mind about it. it was interesting. i'll say that.

[Melynda Yesenia · Rating 1 out of 5]

Yeah, i want my fifteen dollars back.

[Eileen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Strange. Very strange, but I thought it was a fun read.

[MissAliceM · Rating 4 out of 5]

Obscure references, meme theory, serial killers, self-referential humor, reverse culture jamming -- I love it! Hilarious and horrifying!

[Kathy Adams · Rating 2 out of 5]

Confusing and strange.

[Leah]

LOVED IT!

[Chris Meagher · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was so-so. It held my attention throughout, but got a little crazy at the end.

[Johno · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoyed it very much for what it is: a snapshot of pop culture/consumer society, etc. A fun bit of brain candy if you're in-between more seroius tomes.

[Tammy · Rating 2 out of 5]

You don't need to read this book. Just read this sentence "oh, silly hipsters, they're so ridiculous."

[Brynne]

They call this the "new" "bret easton ellis"...but it's hard to compare anyone to a genius like that. The book is good, but it is different and stands on its own.

[Cris · Rating 3 out of 5]

WIERD! Definitely '80's sick.

[Kimberly Fisher · Rating 3 out of 5]

fun read!