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Lost Lustre: A New York Memoir
Muggings on Avenue C, punk bands at CBGB, parties in a nascent SoHo, dropping out from the famous Music & Art High School. In this episodic, coming-of-age memoir, Josh Karlen chronicles growing up in New York's Greenwich Village and crime-ridden Alphabet City in the 70s and early 80s. Lost Lustre recaptures a New York suffering its gravest financial crisis and soaring crime, yet staging a spectacular resurgence of the arts. Karlen shares a fascinating personal history of the punk rock scene through the prism of The Lustres, a band that played venues that launched the Talking Heads, Patti Smith and the Ramones. In the title chapter, Karlen poignantly pays homage to the band's charismatic and talented lead singer, whose life in many ways seemed to mirror his times in both its shining creativity and nihilistically destructive force. Lost Lustre is a reverberant, strata-rich memoir, written with a relaxed and endearing fluency and modesty. I was engrossed. — Edward Hoagland, author of Notes from the Century Before
- GenresMemoirNonfictionNew York
250 pages, Paperback
First published August 1, 2010
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Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews
October 27, 2010
This book wasn't for me. I don't know who this book is for, but I'm not the audience.
When writing about oneself one needs to ask why would anyone care to read about me? Most of the time what people think is really interesting about themselves and their friends turns out to be not so interesting to others. Most of the time the life changing experience you had, the descent into sex and drugs or whatever really isn't interesting to other people, except for people looking for cheap thrills. This book doesn't have a descent into drugs, alcohol and sex; at times the author makes it sound like he got pretty deep into the darkness of boozing and drugging it up, but then he says things that betray a very middle-class view of vice that makes one wonder how much he actually dabbled. For example when he writes in a shocking manner that his friend may have even tried LSD once I can't help but wonder what the big deal is. It's not like he was mainlining speed balls into his dick.
Now, if I were telling the story of a friend in high school and wanted to shock with some LSD talk, I'd say something like this:
It was Friday morning. Really early. I was just finishing up my paper route, driving back to my parents house. It was maybe 7 am. My friend was sitting next to me, he'd been kind of helping me, kind of falling asleep. Normally he was a ball of manic energy helping with the papers. Whatever. As I took the curve on my parents street he popped awake and said, "I think I just stopped tripping."
I didn't know he had been. I said so.
"Yeah, you remember when you and Heather can and picked me up from the Dead show last Friday? I ate a half a sheet (that would be 50 hits or doses) that night. I think I just stopped tripping now."
I'm not trying to one up, I'm just saying taking LSD once isn't like it would be if you were in an episode of Dragnet
But really I don't like reading about drugs and alcohol anymore. The topic is generally boring to me. Which isn't the reason I had a hard time caring about the lengthiest section of the book, the part that dealt with the early death from alcoholism of his childhood friend and musical 'genius'. I didn't care because there was nothing in the writing that made the person stand out. Instead of genius all I saw was the cool kid in high school who never stops being in high school and eventually becomes a living parody. I saw a bunch of stereotypes jacked together and made into a story that felt like it would mean something to the people who knew the person but as a 'so what?' to anyone else. Like I could write a memoir about my friend Matt and all of the great things he did and how he was possibly a genius and how it sucked that he killed himself with heroin but who besides those that knew him would care? He could have been a contender to be a great writer or a world class shop-lifter but he wasn't. He was a talented kid who made some stupid decisions. There is the question of what could have been if he had lived, but there is the question of what could have been if anyone 'lived' their life instead of doing what passes for living.
Anyway, I'm not trying to be mean. These are more just general problems I usually have with memoirs. The why should I care or why should this have been written gets me hung up.
In the case of this book I feel like the book is a mid-life crisis. Each chapter reads more like an essay than part of a fully realized book. And most of the chapters are something like, "something happened that made me think of this in my past, here is what it was, and here is the life lesson I learned from my experience." There is a chapter about his first love, a girl that inexplicably dumped him and who he searches on the internet about thirty years later and emails. This is actually fairly common in the book, the googling old friends of his while working at his Mid-Town Law Office. He shoots off an email saying hi and would you like to get coffee sometime to his high school girlfriend, and a few minutes later writes her a long email describing how he felt for her and wanting to know how she could have broken up with him etc., etc., and she finally emails him back to tell him he is scary and basically get over it. And no, she would not like any coffee.
It's sort of like something out of High Fidelity (at least the movie version I forget the details in the book) where the fancy ex-girlfriend figures out that he is on quest through all of his old girl friends trying to figure out what all went wrong, or what it all means or what he missed the first time around that he believes others happen to be tuned into. The author delves into memory to make sense of his younger self and write about a city that has drastically changed in forty years, but he never succeeds in moving past his own particular concerns and making me feel like I should care what he thinks. I just didn't care and I wondered was there something wrong with me? Was I unfeeling? Would other people care? Why am I not caring? Why do I keep thinking that this whole book should have been a blog for his friends to read and not a book for people to buy?
When writing about oneself one needs to ask why would anyone care to read about me? Most of the time what people think is really interesting about themselves and their friends turns out to be not so interesting to others. Most of the time the life changing experience you had, the descent into sex and drugs or whatever really isn't interesting to other people, except for people looking for cheap thrills. This book doesn't have a descent into drugs, alcohol and sex; at times the author makes it sound like he got pretty deep into the darkness of boozing and drugging it up, but then he says things that betray a very middle-class view of vice that makes one wonder how much he actually dabbled. For example when he writes in a shocking manner that his friend may have even tried LSD once I can't help but wonder what the big deal is. It's not like he was mainlining speed balls into his dick.
Now, if I were telling the story of a friend in high school and wanted to shock with some LSD talk, I'd say something like this:
It was Friday morning. Really early. I was just finishing up my paper route, driving back to my parents house. It was maybe 7 am. My friend was sitting next to me, he'd been kind of helping me, kind of falling asleep. Normally he was a ball of manic energy helping with the papers. Whatever. As I took the curve on my parents street he popped awake and said, "I think I just stopped tripping."
I didn't know he had been. I said so.
"Yeah, you remember when you and Heather can and picked me up from the Dead show last Friday? I ate a half a sheet (that would be 50 hits or doses) that night. I think I just stopped tripping now."
I'm not trying to one up, I'm just saying taking LSD once isn't like it would be if you were in an episode of Dragnet
But really I don't like reading about drugs and alcohol anymore. The topic is generally boring to me. Which isn't the reason I had a hard time caring about the lengthiest section of the book, the part that dealt with the early death from alcoholism of his childhood friend and musical 'genius'. I didn't care because there was nothing in the writing that made the person stand out. Instead of genius all I saw was the cool kid in high school who never stops being in high school and eventually becomes a living parody. I saw a bunch of stereotypes jacked together and made into a story that felt like it would mean something to the people who knew the person but as a 'so what?' to anyone else. Like I could write a memoir about my friend Matt and all of the great things he did and how he was possibly a genius and how it sucked that he killed himself with heroin but who besides those that knew him would care? He could have been a contender to be a great writer or a world class shop-lifter but he wasn't. He was a talented kid who made some stupid decisions. There is the question of what could have been if he had lived, but there is the question of what could have been if anyone 'lived' their life instead of doing what passes for living.
Anyway, I'm not trying to be mean. These are more just general problems I usually have with memoirs. The why should I care or why should this have been written gets me hung up.
In the case of this book I feel like the book is a mid-life crisis. Each chapter reads more like an essay than part of a fully realized book. And most of the chapters are something like, "something happened that made me think of this in my past, here is what it was, and here is the life lesson I learned from my experience." There is a chapter about his first love, a girl that inexplicably dumped him and who he searches on the internet about thirty years later and emails. This is actually fairly common in the book, the googling old friends of his while working at his Mid-Town Law Office. He shoots off an email saying hi and would you like to get coffee sometime to his high school girlfriend, and a few minutes later writes her a long email describing how he felt for her and wanting to know how she could have broken up with him etc., etc., and she finally emails him back to tell him he is scary and basically get over it. And no, she would not like any coffee.
It's sort of like something out of High Fidelity (at least the movie version I forget the details in the book) where the fancy ex-girlfriend figures out that he is on quest through all of his old girl friends trying to figure out what all went wrong, or what it all means or what he missed the first time around that he believes others happen to be tuned into. The author delves into memory to make sense of his younger self and write about a city that has drastically changed in forty years, but he never succeeds in moving past his own particular concerns and making me feel like I should care what he thinks. I just didn't care and I wondered was there something wrong with me? Was I unfeeling? Would other people care? Why am I not caring? Why do I keep thinking that this whole book should have been a blog for his friends to read and not a book for people to buy?
September 12, 2010
Kind of a chore to get through this. The first chapter is a drawn out ode to the sixties that shot my enthusiasm for this book in the foot. The next chapter describes a long-gone New York City, and that was enjoyable, though I'll admit to being a bit of a New York-aphile. There are chapters about old friends and long lost loves that have their moments, but overall the book can't seem to shake off the weight of the author's weird mix of self-pity, solipsism and nostalgia.
Thinking perhaps it was just a case of not being in the target demographic, I passed the book to my mom. Her review was also mixed.
I really wanted to root for Karlen to pull out a win, but the guy's a lawyer in real life. His writing style leaves much to be desired and gives the impression that this memoir was just an attempt to exorcise his multitude of old ghosts.
Thinking perhaps it was just a case of not being in the target demographic, I passed the book to my mom. Her review was also mixed.
I really wanted to root for Karlen to pull out a win, but the guy's a lawyer in real life. His writing style leaves much to be desired and gives the impression that this memoir was just an attempt to exorcise his multitude of old ghosts.
November 2, 2010
Well, I do really like winning Early Reviewers books. Unfortunately, I really didn't like reading this one.
These essays are almost unbearably dry. Not like Hugh Laurie is dry, but like Prohibition was dry. It reads a little like someone writing a college paper. (How to fill up another half a page? Let me restate my themes.) Other times the level of detail is like reading someone's journal. You always think you want to read someone's journal, but really, it's boring.
Generally, there is a problem with artistry. He dumps in quoted dictionary definitions more than once, in order to state, this describes me perfectly. Which may be accurate, but the problem is that there's nothing at all literary about that. Why write it? Why mention it if you don't want to say anything about it yourself? He also block quotes extensively from friends' emails, which just seems weird, in order to sort of back up what he's been saying. It's like he's challenging us: See?
The central story about his friend who has died is the nicest one, and I did like reading it. It even had a line that struck me: "With an inner shudder of tenderness, I recognized the squalid surroundings framed in the snapshot." Not all of the writing makes so much sense, though. Sometimes, even when he's explaining something, he states the obvious to a stultifying degree. "Our sadness was for a lost friend, or boyfriend, whose memory also had become intertwined with nostalgia for our youth, who was frozen in our minds in our teenage years in New York in the seventies and eighties." What is this, SEO?
A lot of this book is about his troubles and fears in his very bad neighborhood growing up, when the East Village (around Avenue C) was in terrible shape and filled with drug crime. I confess, I was impressed by the photos of blocks of rubbled apartment buildings in the area. I didn't imagine it so drastically. As a kid, he was mugged there about once a year, though he makes it sound like it was every day. I'm sure it was really scary every day, but something about his approach to explaining his feelings about this just makes you want to nitpick. Somehow what he's written sounds ignorant and defensive, as if we won't believe him -- which, makes a reader want to doubt him.
Also? The perspective is a little bit racist. Not every reader may agree with that, but I wasn't super comfortable. I recognize it is sensitive to describe facts involving race, like the environment in which you live and the descriptions of people who attacked you. I don't think it's wrong to write about or specify, but I suppose I just don't like the way Karlen does so. At best, he mentions non-white people at an arms-length separation, and at worst makes it sound like really it would be nicer for him if their culture didn't exist at all, because it scares or alienates him. They're not all gangsters of course, but he would just be more comfortable if they weren't all speaking other languages, or playing music with horns in it. How do they think that makes him feel?
There are some other really unflattering stories, like the one about his first girlfriend -- which I liked, until it got all stalkery -- and the one about being a surly tourist in Peru. The thing is, he tells these stories with some perspective, such as saying he made a mistake or had a bad attitude. But there isn't much more framing than that. He isn't acknowledging how that impacted anything, and so I'm figuring he's not too interested. For such a self-described artist, punk, and bohemian, this man sounds so unenlightened. Why do I feel more enlightened than him? He's the author of this book. What's wrong here?
There is a funny element wherein he reminisces at length about Homer's diner (in the 1980s), which used to be across from my school (in the 2000s). Meg and I discovered it during our sophomore year, I think, and spent a lot of lunch breaks there, and then when we came back junior year, it had closed over the summer and we felt like we'd let it die while school was out. I think it was junior year. See: if I was the author, I would write now about, why don't I remember what year it was? How funny that so many years go by and all I remember are the cheese blintzes that were the bad kind you could get frozen at the grocery store, but I don't remember what we were saying or what we were wearing. How many other cheese blintzes have I forgotten? I left my office and stumbled out into the rain to Sixth Avenue, driven to revisit the block where the restaurant had stood, not knowing what I was seeking, finding only an upscale bistro where once I had sat in my thrifted clothing. Memory makes you remember.
There's just many weirdly elementary conclusions of this kind. The opening piece almost did me in. Did you know the 1960s can be defined in many ways, but particularly by the Beatles? It's... true. In another one, the comparison, "as though they were lining Times Square temples devoted not to Apollo or Bacchus, but to Mars or Ares." To... the...? MARS AND ARES ARE THE SAME ONE. OMG seriously. "Where were the heathen pageants and orgiastic fertility dances?" I... it hurts.
However. Another star, because some of this is genuinely thoughtful, and Karlen cares about what he's saying. And because I like New York so much, I like the Village, I like the period and what details Karlen can offer of it. I like people's struggles with memory in general and NYC's constant, unsettled changes in particular. They're rich conflicts for a book. And I will be very happy to read another, different book about them, by somebody else, also.
These essays are almost unbearably dry. Not like Hugh Laurie is dry, but like Prohibition was dry. It reads a little like someone writing a college paper. (How to fill up another half a page? Let me restate my themes.) Other times the level of detail is like reading someone's journal. You always think you want to read someone's journal, but really, it's boring.
Generally, there is a problem with artistry. He dumps in quoted dictionary definitions more than once, in order to state, this describes me perfectly. Which may be accurate, but the problem is that there's nothing at all literary about that. Why write it? Why mention it if you don't want to say anything about it yourself? He also block quotes extensively from friends' emails, which just seems weird, in order to sort of back up what he's been saying. It's like he's challenging us: See?
The central story about his friend who has died is the nicest one, and I did like reading it. It even had a line that struck me: "With an inner shudder of tenderness, I recognized the squalid surroundings framed in the snapshot." Not all of the writing makes so much sense, though. Sometimes, even when he's explaining something, he states the obvious to a stultifying degree. "Our sadness was for a lost friend, or boyfriend, whose memory also had become intertwined with nostalgia for our youth, who was frozen in our minds in our teenage years in New York in the seventies and eighties." What is this, SEO?
A lot of this book is about his troubles and fears in his very bad neighborhood growing up, when the East Village (around Avenue C) was in terrible shape and filled with drug crime. I confess, I was impressed by the photos of blocks of rubbled apartment buildings in the area. I didn't imagine it so drastically. As a kid, he was mugged there about once a year, though he makes it sound like it was every day. I'm sure it was really scary every day, but something about his approach to explaining his feelings about this just makes you want to nitpick. Somehow what he's written sounds ignorant and defensive, as if we won't believe him -- which, makes a reader want to doubt him.
Also? The perspective is a little bit racist. Not every reader may agree with that, but I wasn't super comfortable. I recognize it is sensitive to describe facts involving race, like the environment in which you live and the descriptions of people who attacked you. I don't think it's wrong to write about or specify, but I suppose I just don't like the way Karlen does so. At best, he mentions non-white people at an arms-length separation, and at worst makes it sound like really it would be nicer for him if their culture didn't exist at all, because it scares or alienates him. They're not all gangsters of course, but he would just be more comfortable if they weren't all speaking other languages, or playing music with horns in it. How do they think that makes him feel?
There are some other really unflattering stories, like the one about his first girlfriend -- which I liked, until it got all stalkery -- and the one about being a surly tourist in Peru. The thing is, he tells these stories with some perspective, such as saying he made a mistake or had a bad attitude. But there isn't much more framing than that. He isn't acknowledging how that impacted anything, and so I'm figuring he's not too interested. For such a self-described artist, punk, and bohemian, this man sounds so unenlightened. Why do I feel more enlightened than him? He's the author of this book. What's wrong here?
There is a funny element wherein he reminisces at length about Homer's diner (in the 1980s), which used to be across from my school (in the 2000s). Meg and I discovered it during our sophomore year, I think, and spent a lot of lunch breaks there, and then when we came back junior year, it had closed over the summer and we felt like we'd let it die while school was out. I think it was junior year. See: if I was the author, I would write now about, why don't I remember what year it was? How funny that so many years go by and all I remember are the cheese blintzes that were the bad kind you could get frozen at the grocery store, but I don't remember what we were saying or what we were wearing. How many other cheese blintzes have I forgotten? I left my office and stumbled out into the rain to Sixth Avenue, driven to revisit the block where the restaurant had stood, not knowing what I was seeking, finding only an upscale bistro where once I had sat in my thrifted clothing. Memory makes you remember.
There's just many weirdly elementary conclusions of this kind. The opening piece almost did me in. Did you know the 1960s can be defined in many ways, but particularly by the Beatles? It's... true. In another one, the comparison, "as though they were lining Times Square temples devoted not to Apollo or Bacchus, but to Mars or Ares." To... the...? MARS AND ARES ARE THE SAME ONE. OMG seriously. "Where were the heathen pageants and orgiastic fertility dances?" I... it hurts.
However. Another star, because some of this is genuinely thoughtful, and Karlen cares about what he's saying. And because I like New York so much, I like the Village, I like the period and what details Karlen can offer of it. I like people's struggles with memory in general and NYC's constant, unsettled changes in particular. They're rich conflicts for a book. And I will be very happy to read another, different book about them, by somebody else, also.
September 13, 2010
(Reprinted from the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography [cclapcenter.com]. I am the original author of this essay, as well as the owner of CCLaP; it is not being reprinted illegally.)
I've been publicly involved in the arts now in one way or another for around 25 years, from my teenage days in St. Louis' punk scene until now; so believe me when I say just how many amazing artists I've now seen in my life who ended up giving up on the pursuit, sometimes through burnout and sometimes simply to embrace middle-class mediocrity instead, a natural impulse given the human condition but still always a melancholy experience at best, a sad realization that yet another former creative has officially given up the good fight. And so that's why it was such an unexpectedly emotional experience to read Josh Karlen's excellent new memoir, Lost Lustre, because of it essentially concerning exactly what I just mentioned; it's a look back at Karlen's youth in the pre-gentrified Lower East Side of '70s Manhattan, where at a certain point a bunch of his high-school buddies formed a New Wave band called The Lustres, and quickly found themselves rubbing elbows with the Ramones and the Talking Heads at places like CBGB, only to fall apart just as quickly when realizing that they were never going to be much more popular than a local bar band at the rate they were progressing, and with the majority of the now twentysomething members not wanting to take the gamble to go for broke and try to elevate themselves into a full-time nationally touring group.
And in fact, as we see in Karlen's well-done if not sometimes purplish manuscript, as is the case with many bands like these, the Lustres only got as far as they did in the first place through the dogged determination of their lead singer, the charming but self-destructive Tim Jordan who most acquaintances still remember thirty years later as a one-man force of nature, the band's rise and fall as a group tied intricately to his own struggle with alcohol. Talking with all his old school buddies for this book for the first time in decades, Karlen comes to realize that it was Jordan's personality and work ethic that almost singlehandedly drove the band to the few successes they had over their five years as a group; and it was his growing addiction and resulting lethargy that brought the group to an end, as the other members all eventually came to worry more about kids and stable careers than in making art, leaving Jordan to eventually die bitter and alone of his demons in the early '90s, still pursuing his music but now too besottled to have any realistic chance of success.
It's an infinitely sad story, one of dashed hopes and failed dreams, one that former journalist and now middle-class media specialist Karlen fills with wistful regret, and I found myself really responding to it in this visceral, moving way; and even though the story of the band itself only takes up around half of the manuscript, the rest being reminisces about girls, travels, his bohemian parents and growing up Jewish, none of which is nearly as interesting, I'm still giving the book a big recommendation to my fellow middle-aged "creative classers" going through the same struggles, and am also giving indie film producers fair notice that this would make for one of those perfect kind of low-budget costume dramas that win all those dark-horse Oscars every winter. I highly encourage you to pick up a copy as soon as you have a chance.
Out of 10: 9.0, or 10 for aging Gen-Xers
I've been publicly involved in the arts now in one way or another for around 25 years, from my teenage days in St. Louis' punk scene until now; so believe me when I say just how many amazing artists I've now seen in my life who ended up giving up on the pursuit, sometimes through burnout and sometimes simply to embrace middle-class mediocrity instead, a natural impulse given the human condition but still always a melancholy experience at best, a sad realization that yet another former creative has officially given up the good fight. And so that's why it was such an unexpectedly emotional experience to read Josh Karlen's excellent new memoir, Lost Lustre, because of it essentially concerning exactly what I just mentioned; it's a look back at Karlen's youth in the pre-gentrified Lower East Side of '70s Manhattan, where at a certain point a bunch of his high-school buddies formed a New Wave band called The Lustres, and quickly found themselves rubbing elbows with the Ramones and the Talking Heads at places like CBGB, only to fall apart just as quickly when realizing that they were never going to be much more popular than a local bar band at the rate they were progressing, and with the majority of the now twentysomething members not wanting to take the gamble to go for broke and try to elevate themselves into a full-time nationally touring group.
And in fact, as we see in Karlen's well-done if not sometimes purplish manuscript, as is the case with many bands like these, the Lustres only got as far as they did in the first place through the dogged determination of their lead singer, the charming but self-destructive Tim Jordan who most acquaintances still remember thirty years later as a one-man force of nature, the band's rise and fall as a group tied intricately to his own struggle with alcohol. Talking with all his old school buddies for this book for the first time in decades, Karlen comes to realize that it was Jordan's personality and work ethic that almost singlehandedly drove the band to the few successes they had over their five years as a group; and it was his growing addiction and resulting lethargy that brought the group to an end, as the other members all eventually came to worry more about kids and stable careers than in making art, leaving Jordan to eventually die bitter and alone of his demons in the early '90s, still pursuing his music but now too besottled to have any realistic chance of success.
It's an infinitely sad story, one of dashed hopes and failed dreams, one that former journalist and now middle-class media specialist Karlen fills with wistful regret, and I found myself really responding to it in this visceral, moving way; and even though the story of the band itself only takes up around half of the manuscript, the rest being reminisces about girls, travels, his bohemian parents and growing up Jewish, none of which is nearly as interesting, I'm still giving the book a big recommendation to my fellow middle-aged "creative classers" going through the same struggles, and am also giving indie film producers fair notice that this would make for one of those perfect kind of low-budget costume dramas that win all those dark-horse Oscars every winter. I highly encourage you to pick up a copy as soon as you have a chance.
Out of 10: 9.0, or 10 for aging Gen-Xers
September 5, 2010
Received this book through first-reads.
I'm not usually one for memoirs or biographies and the like. The setting of this book did intreigue me though. Running through New York from the '60's to today, including the punk scene as seen through the authors eyes. There were times while reading this books where I wasn't sure if I liked it or not. Then there would be a chapter or a few back-to-back that were written so well I felt like I was the author living through an amazing time in NYC history while adjusting to adolesence resulting in my inability to put the book down.
If you are at all interested in alphabet city, the village, memoirs or the punk scene of the early 80's (mainly) you definitely should pick up this book and give it a read. I enjoyed being thrown into that unfamiliar world. I was one of the kids the author mentions from his college years; growing up in the midwest and being fascinated by what I've heard about NYC, NY.
I'm not usually one for memoirs or biographies and the like. The setting of this book did intreigue me though. Running through New York from the '60's to today, including the punk scene as seen through the authors eyes. There were times while reading this books where I wasn't sure if I liked it or not. Then there would be a chapter or a few back-to-back that were written so well I felt like I was the author living through an amazing time in NYC history while adjusting to adolesence resulting in my inability to put the book down.
If you are at all interested in alphabet city, the village, memoirs or the punk scene of the early 80's (mainly) you definitely should pick up this book and give it a read. I enjoyed being thrown into that unfamiliar world. I was one of the kids the author mentions from his college years; growing up in the midwest and being fascinated by what I've heard about NYC, NY.
December 24, 2010
Lost Lustre by Josh Karlen is described as a New York memoir and includes several sections each of which describes a particular portion of Karlen's life and how it was growing up in New York City during the 70s and 80s. Karlen and his brother moved to Alphabet City with their mother after their parents divorced, in a time when the area was full of crumbling buildings that would not be out of place is a post-apocalyptic film. However the story left me wondering- if Avenue C was really so awful, then why didn't Karlen's father who took his sons every weekend over to his safe and happy home fight for custody, or even mention to their mother that he didn't like where they were living? Karlen and his brother are so out of place in where they live, and their mother's decision to move there so odd, that I wish the book had better tried to explain why his mother thought it was a good idea besides for a vague belief that the area would gentrify. Also, the word "gentrify" is so incredibly over-used if I read it again in the next few months I am liable to put a book down for that reason alone.
Each portion of Lost Lustre is connected only by the fact that they all involve some aspect of Karlen's life, which makes the book read more like a collection of essays than something that could truly be described as a memoir. In addition, when an author is writing a memoir paramount to its success is the ability to make the reader actually care about the outcome, and the unfortunate truth was that I was completely bored and unsympathetic to Karlen especially when he manages to wallow in self-pity for much of the book for various reasons, including the fact that he was mugged a few times and that his first love dumped him without explanation. The one redeeming chapter of Lost Lustre is the one after which the book is actually titled, and it describes the life, and premature death, of Karlen's highschool friend who was the lead singer of a band called the Lustres and died at 28 from alcoholism. It is in this portion of the book Karlen excels by capturing the spirit of the eighties and the tragedy of potential destroyed by addiction. Interestingly enough, it is also the one portion of the book which is not directly about him. Ultimately, although I didn't personally get a lot out of Lost Lustre, I would sincerely recommend it to people who are interested in the history of New York, especially the seventies and eighties, as I do feel like Karlen gave a genuine sense of the time period and place.
Each portion of Lost Lustre is connected only by the fact that they all involve some aspect of Karlen's life, which makes the book read more like a collection of essays than something that could truly be described as a memoir. In addition, when an author is writing a memoir paramount to its success is the ability to make the reader actually care about the outcome, and the unfortunate truth was that I was completely bored and unsympathetic to Karlen especially when he manages to wallow in self-pity for much of the book for various reasons, including the fact that he was mugged a few times and that his first love dumped him without explanation. The one redeeming chapter of Lost Lustre is the one after which the book is actually titled, and it describes the life, and premature death, of Karlen's highschool friend who was the lead singer of a band called the Lustres and died at 28 from alcoholism. It is in this portion of the book Karlen excels by capturing the spirit of the eighties and the tragedy of potential destroyed by addiction. Interestingly enough, it is also the one portion of the book which is not directly about him. Ultimately, although I didn't personally get a lot out of Lost Lustre, I would sincerely recommend it to people who are interested in the history of New York, especially the seventies and eighties, as I do feel like Karlen gave a genuine sense of the time period and place.
January 26, 2011
Born in 1964, the author grew up in a poverty stricken, crime ridden part of New York City. This book chronicles his life from childhood to college in a series of related essays. The misery of growing up as a Jewish child with his mother and step-father in a black and Puerto Rican neighborhood that was full of violent gangs that robbed and beat him regularly; his first love and how she broke his heart; what old movies meant to him when he was a teenager; how he longed to find a Bohemian place to live without realizing that his weekends with his father and step-mother in Greenwich Village were in the most Bohemian place on earth at the time. But the heart of the book is the piece that gives the book its name: Lost Lustre. The Lustres were a band formed Karlen’s best friend, a punk rock band that performed at such early 1980s New York clubs as CBGB and Danceteria. The band was short lived, though, in large part because Tim Jordan, the band’s leader, lyricist and singer was a raging alcoholic and drug abuser who became impossible to work with. His life continued on a downward spiral after the band broke up and he died at age 28. Best friends from the ages of 10 to 20, Karlen had not communicated with Jordan for 16 years when he found that Jordan had died only two years after their last meeting. Jordan had been making a real effort to turn his life around right before he died, but the years of alcohol of abuse had already taken their toll.
It’s an unusual format for writing a memoir, but it works; first laying down the framework and then filling in various parts. But it leaves spots unfilled out: why were 14 year olds being served alcohol at bars and clubs? Why did the parents never notice their kids coming come drunk? Why did Karlen’s parents not notice that he came home bruised and bloody? One may think that growing up with Bohemian parents and clubbing as a teen sounds romantic, but it turns out that the parents weren’t paying attention and the clubs were boring when your friends weren’t playing.
It’s an unusual format for writing a memoir, but it works; first laying down the framework and then filling in various parts. But it leaves spots unfilled out: why were 14 year olds being served alcohol at bars and clubs? Why did the parents never notice their kids coming come drunk? Why did Karlen’s parents not notice that he came home bruised and bloody? One may think that growing up with Bohemian parents and clubbing as a teen sounds romantic, but it turns out that the parents weren’t paying attention and the clubs were boring when your friends weren’t playing.
February 1, 2011
I didn't know what to expect when I received this book from Library Thing's EARLY REVIEWERS program......what I got was a small gem.
Josh Karlen grew up on Avenue C in New York City...where the tenements burned and their charred skeletons remained "standing"...where beatings by other kids were a daily part of life...where despair pretty much ruled his world. Along came the Punk Rock/Club scene of the 1970s-early 1980s, where he , at least, had an outlet for his pent-up aggression...Punk Rock in its Flower....until it morphed into the citywide gentrification that folks now call "normal"
This book is part personal history and a cultural history of a time and place(s) that no longer exist...the title chapter is the history of New York Punk writ small and personal. Heartbreaking, tragic, hubristic and gaudy....yet full of a strange kind of hope. As is the entire book. This history is written as the map of Mr Karlen's environs, as he inhabited them, then...and as he remembers them now....written without sensationalism or self-pity. From the Greek diners to the smelly Punk Clubs....the SRO hotels and St Marks place with its trash and vaudeville. Through grammar school to Music & Art (from which he flunked out) to the Amazon jungle....it's all here. One man's search for his true home.
A prosaic undertaking, to be sure...as we have all made that journey. But this particular trek is set down in a literate, clear-eyed prose that made the reading a pure delight. I am grateful to have found this book, since New York City was a kind of "dream city" for me when I was growing up in Akron, Ohio...I was a little old for the Punk scene when it hit....but I certainly loved the energy and rawness of the music. This book shows some of that scene's flip side...which the music rags never did. In the end, it's a story full of hope. I recommend it to anyone who is still searching for his/her true "place of belonging".
4 stars (****)
Josh Karlen grew up on Avenue C in New York City...where the tenements burned and their charred skeletons remained "standing"...where beatings by other kids were a daily part of life...where despair pretty much ruled his world. Along came the Punk Rock/Club scene of the 1970s-early 1980s, where he , at least, had an outlet for his pent-up aggression...Punk Rock in its Flower....until it morphed into the citywide gentrification that folks now call "normal"
This book is part personal history and a cultural history of a time and place(s) that no longer exist...the title chapter is the history of New York Punk writ small and personal. Heartbreaking, tragic, hubristic and gaudy....yet full of a strange kind of hope. As is the entire book. This history is written as the map of Mr Karlen's environs, as he inhabited them, then...and as he remembers them now....written without sensationalism or self-pity. From the Greek diners to the smelly Punk Clubs....the SRO hotels and St Marks place with its trash and vaudeville. Through grammar school to Music & Art (from which he flunked out) to the Amazon jungle....it's all here. One man's search for his true home.
A prosaic undertaking, to be sure...as we have all made that journey. But this particular trek is set down in a literate, clear-eyed prose that made the reading a pure delight. I am grateful to have found this book, since New York City was a kind of "dream city" for me when I was growing up in Akron, Ohio...I was a little old for the Punk scene when it hit....but I certainly loved the energy and rawness of the music. This book shows some of that scene's flip side...which the music rags never did. In the end, it's a story full of hope. I recommend it to anyone who is still searching for his/her true "place of belonging".
4 stars (****)
September 18, 2010
I enjoyed this memoir about growing up on New York's Lower East Side. For a young boy, life was not easy for Josh Karlen and his younger brother. Their parents split when they were barely out of diapers. While Karlen's father settled in cosy Greenwich Village, his mother moved into an apartment in a ghetto that looked as though it were in the midst of a war. Crumbling brick buildings, burned out tenements, and gang-ridden streets made up the landscape of his block. If he was lucky after school, he could run from the bus stop to his apartment unscathed. Many times, though, he was greeted by thugs as he exited the bus, all while the driver slammed the door closed and watched Karlen being mugged on the other side of the protective glass. In high school, Karlen turned to drugs and alcohol, but also became a part of the legendary nightlife at CBGB, the club where some of rock's greatests started out. Each chapter is written as though it could stand alone, so the book doesn't always follow chronological order, but it works here.
January 8, 2011
Josh Karlen has written a terrific memoir about the lost days of decades, not so long in the past.
From his terrifying childhood in the projects of Alphabet City, to the dives where he followed music, Karlen writes beautifully. Remembering a friend, a musician and writer who died too young, his words are heartbreaking. Even though they had not been in touch for years, the death greatly affected him.
When Karlen writes about his first love, it made me remember those feelings, long forgotten.
Looking at photos, finding himself wearing a hat he has no memory of, he finally remembers his hat.
The way he writes expresses how I feel as I get older, how memories are tricky. Having a sudden revelation about his forgotten hat, is like finding a memory, hidden and thought to be long lost. Memory is funny that way. Good or bad, suddenly something comes flashing back, and it is ours again.
I received this book from Library Thing Early Reviewers. Thank you!!
From his terrifying childhood in the projects of Alphabet City, to the dives where he followed music, Karlen writes beautifully. Remembering a friend, a musician and writer who died too young, his words are heartbreaking. Even though they had not been in touch for years, the death greatly affected him.
When Karlen writes about his first love, it made me remember those feelings, long forgotten.
Looking at photos, finding himself wearing a hat he has no memory of, he finally remembers his hat.
The way he writes expresses how I feel as I get older, how memories are tricky. Having a sudden revelation about his forgotten hat, is like finding a memory, hidden and thought to be long lost. Memory is funny that way. Good or bad, suddenly something comes flashing back, and it is ours again.
I received this book from Library Thing Early Reviewers. Thank you!!
December 14, 2010
Raised in New York city in the 1970's and early 1980's, Josh Karlen's parents split up when he was in grade school. His mother moved to the part of New York with her new husband and children, referred to as the Alphabet City. It was not a nice part of the city at all but Josh's mom reassured her children that it was going to be gentrified soon. Besides, there apartment was really nice.
That was little reassurance to her two young boys who kept getting mugged and beaten for as little as a carton of milk or just because. In Lost Lustre, Josh Karlen re-lives those years growing up on C Avenue. He also tells about his best friend, Tim Jordon who was in a band called the Lustres'.
This memoir is really a book of essays that could..Read the rest of my review here
That was little reassurance to her two young boys who kept getting mugged and beaten for as little as a carton of milk or just because. In Lost Lustre, Josh Karlen re-lives those years growing up on C Avenue. He also tells about his best friend, Tim Jordon who was in a band called the Lustres'.
This memoir is really a book of essays that could..Read the rest of my review here
September 4, 2010
I won this in a Goodreads give-away and must say I wouldn't have read it, otherwise. It starts out very good with the author recounting what it was like growing up in Alphabet City in NY in the 70s and 80s. The section on his childhood friend Tim and the band The Lustres was also interesting. However, it went downhill from there. I found the author whiny and unlikeable. Very few names are used in the book and there is no sense of who Josh Karlen really is. I also thought he got very repetitive, and overall I was uninterested in the novel as a whole. By themselves, each section is good. I would rather read stories like this independently of each other, because I didn't feel they flowed well together. Overall, an ok read but not great.
October 28, 2013
Although well written I almost stopped reading it because it seemed to jump around so much in the first section alone. I wasn't really sure what was going on to start with. I also felt like there was no cohesiveness to each of the sections except that the author was part of them, I really didn't feel like the stories each came together in the end or that there was a line that could be drawn. I also wasn't sure why he spent so much time talking about his friend if there was no comparison back to his own life. It almost felt like the story about his friend should have been a completely separate book and didn't seem to fit with the other stories since it was focused on the other person and not on him and that friend.
September 6, 2010
This is sort of like a collection of essays by the author about growing up in NYC. It was interesting to read about the city back then and I liked the author's writing style. However, I felt like it was a bit drawn out, like if it was 50 pages long it would've been fine. It made me think the author is kind of stuck in the past, trying to hold on to his youth, which I'm not sure was the intention.
I think it just wasn't for me but I'm sure people who maybe lived through similar childhoods as the author might enjoy it more.
I think it just wasn't for me but I'm sure people who maybe lived through similar childhoods as the author might enjoy it more.
September 14, 2010
I liked the book. This is my first memoir and I enjoyed it. There were chapters that I liked a little more than others and was left as if I'm missing something though, not sure what. I'll definitely read another of this guy's books. This was also a "First-reads" Book, and it was a good start. Hope to get others that are as good or better. I missed reading.
December 31, 2010
A (for the most part) interesting memoir of a man growing up in New York City in the gritty 1970s and 80s. Karlen is at his best when he describes the neighborhoods, people, and experiences of his youth, and lost me a little bit when he waxed philosophical and dipped too often into the well of self-reflective nostalgia. Occasionally overwritten, but for the most part a nice read that gives you a sense of the man and his formative city. [Free review copy from the LibaryThing Early Reviewers program]
September 15, 2010
Disclaimer: I received this book as part of the Goodreads Firstreads giveaway.
This book struck a wonderful chord with me. It has a bit of everything and it reminded me of childhood fears both real and imagined, of friends lost too early, of girls that meant so much and just faded...of just so many things. All the stories are entertaining and well written. I think everybody should give this quick read a chance.
This book struck a wonderful chord with me. It has a bit of everything and it reminded me of childhood fears both real and imagined, of friends lost too early, of girls that meant so much and just faded...of just so many things. All the stories are entertaining and well written. I think everybody should give this quick read a chance.
October 31, 2010
Essentially one guy's reminisces on New York in the late 70s and 80s, when Alphabet City was really seedy. Author is a nostalgic who uses a memory to trigger an essay a particular moment in the city's history. I thought it was a good blend of the memoir of a person and the memoir of a place. His descriptions sucked you into the scene and into his own memories.
January 22, 2015
I liked the book, I love to read memoirs....they are soooooooooo different then bios. I grow up in nyc, and I like when I know just what the author is talking about..when he names places, streets, clubs and bars....it wasn't lower east side, story, that I thought it was....
Want to Read
August 26, 2010From Publisher
Want to Read
September 5, 2010cool, my latest First Reads win! sounds like an interesting memior!
nice, got it in the mail today, sounds even better than i thought! might have to start reading it right away.
nice, got it in the mail today, sounds even better than i thought! might have to start reading it right away.
September 16, 2010
A well written memoir about a man who is comming to terms with his memories of growing up in Alphabet City in Newyork, and reflecting on how it has affected his life and those he knew.
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