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Action, Figure
In a war-torn wasteland someone wakes wounded and blind to a life they don’t remember or understand. Halfway across the world a woman builds an intricate city out of personal debris to celebrate a brief period of happiness. Just downstairs a man sits meditating before his rumbling clothes dryer contemplating harsh realities of adulthood that seem to be rushing forth to consume. These are the lives of Frank and Lili, two roommates and sometimes lovers unable to accept or cope with anything but each other.
Set amongst an unknown exploding city and Halifax, the city that once exploded, Action, Figure moves within and merges streaming consciousness, self-loathing, and the recovering mind as three lost souls move to scaffold realities they don’t accept. To cope they attack themselves in whatever way they can, hoping that whatever survives will see through to better days.
Set amongst an unknown exploding city and Halifax, the city that once exploded, Action, Figure moves within and merges streaming consciousness, self-loathing, and the recovering mind as three lost souls move to scaffold realities they don’t accept. To cope they attack themselves in whatever way they can, hoping that whatever survives will see through to better days.
- GenresFiction
160 pages, Kindle Edition
First published August 16, 2012
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
November 26, 2012
My daughter shrieked this morning: “There is a book for you! Did you write it?” I denied. “Did you make the cover?”—“No, honey, I’m sorry.” — The book was ACTION, FIGURE by Frank Hinton and for some reason I thought it would be a thin book. The reason probably being that most indie presses seem to publish thin books in large print. At 336 pages, this is a thick book, not a thin book. Because it was so surprised, I took a picture of it next to our current favorite soap. I have this book on my desk next to me now. It doesn’t matter where I open it: it’s all good. It’s for vampire lovers, too:
I think I’m going to love this book.
«Frank made a vampire face and then pretended to bite into it a bag of pet food. Penny was laughing again and Frank felt good inside. She was easy to entertain, simple really. Frank took second to inspect her. She was an Etsy girl, dolled up in something yarnish, all browns and yellows, thick glasses and too much lipstick. She had a nice body though. Her breasts were large and pulled her down into a sexy but gibbous posture. Frank thought of his own slight hunch. He wondered if they could be together. When kissing late form a kind of golden arches.» (p. 173)
I think I’m going to love this book.
December 13, 2012
The majority of Action/Figure follows two storylines disparate in setting but similar in themes and tone. The first opens with Rapunzel, who has suffered a strange accident in a foreign, war-torn country. We come upon her amnesic, blind, restrained and surfacing from delirium. She is cut off from those around her by the language barrier. When English speakers do begin to arrive and speak with her their intentions are not clear. The chapters alternate with the stories of Frank and Lili, two room mates in Halifax. Both are graduated students, aimless and confused about their imminent adulthood. While they only allude to past events it is obvious that in past years their house was once a chaotic party spot, but is now reduced to a shade of its former self as former room-mates left to pursue other endeavors. The way Hinton paints this setting, the ruin, and allows us to fill the gaps of the past through only a few dropped lines is quite impressive and allows each reader to potentially form a personal back story to suit.
Rapunzel's story forms and resolves slowly as she, and we, learn about the events that lead up to her hospitalizaiton. At a certain point she begins to mention You. The reader or another, You are very important to Rapunzel and she did something very dire to attain You and which was the cause of her hospitalizaiton. You are home to Rapunzel, and in this foreign land her central desire is to get to you, to get home.
Frank and Lili are almost defined by their inability to function in society, but in very different ways and Hinton mirrors this in their narration. Lili's chapters are told in first person and this fits well as she is wracked by an introspective obsession. When the novel opens she is on a "good" day and seems like any other 20 somethings, a little lost in the world but otherwise okay: she creates a city of clothes in her room, visits with her "boyfriend" with whom she has a confusing and complicated relationship and worries about a meeting with her family. In fact both Lili and Frank obsess over imminent meetings with their families, and both groups are toxic in appropriately different ways to each, their influence driving both into their respective mental cages. As time goes on it becomes apparent that this "good day" is a rare one for Lili, a fluke, and her insecurities begin to come out in disastrous ways. Frank's narrative is told in the third person; he is apart from himself, unable to connect with his thoughts, emotions or the world around him. He seeks and coerces sex from Lili and his cousin and seems unable to feel affection, simply screwing to pass the time and branding himself as abusive (and rightfully so). Frank's entire post college goal amounts to playing with action figures for half an hour a day to become more childlike.
Navigating the hazy labyrinth between childhood and adulthood is a major theme of the novel. Frank and Lili are on the edge, either unsure or unable to commit to a stable adult life style. Along with Frank's action figure collection one night Lili takes cocaine with some friends and goes to a playground and meditates:
"I look around the playground. When is the last time I played on a playground? Why do people grow up and work and do things? I imagine a society by balancing their time between self-sustaining farms and playgrounds. You work a little, play a little. You hoe a little, you slide a little. Why doesn't this society exist? Why can't I be the leader of a society like this? I want my childhood back."
The childish genius, the naive clarity of this statement... Some of us entertain thoughts like this every day, for others of us the very notion is completely ludicrous. Lili continues:
"I am going to unlock some secret from my youth in this playground. The secret will help to understand my adult-self more maybe."
This is the thesis of the work, looking back to childhood to break through the barrier to adulthood, trying to find the spark that will carry one through the tedium and malaise of adult life. Lili and Frank are the casualties of this endeavor, and Hinton closes the novel before we ever learn whether they are successful or not. In a similar vein Rapunzel describes her first "awakening" in the hospital as a birth and she is cared for yet confined, much like as in childhood. At a certain point Rapunzel finds herself alone, yet free to do as she pleases and takes the first steps into the outside world. She describes this as a second birth: her attainment of a symbolic adulthood. Rapunzel attains what Frank and Lili fear and hope for and her story spirals off into a poetic journey into the heart of her forsaken country and ends ambiguously, at her darkest moment an apparent redemption arrives, perhaps.
I felt a distinct sadness at the end of Frank, Lili's and Rapunzel's stories. Not a sadness for the characters themselves but that undefinable sadness one may feel as a really good journey ends, as you realize that the place you have been for the last few days or months is not and never has been real. The sadness that the world of the novel, no matter how flawed and dark was an almost realer place than the one we experience during waking life. I found this novel to be quite personal, Hinton allows enough room for the reader to fill in gaps and unconscionably make it their own.
The final episode in Action/Figure is distinctly separate from the other two stories and follows a boy and a girl who eternally walk along an isolated shore. The prototypical love story: just two people finding solace in each other amongst the waste of the world. Perhaps this story is a dream or hallucination of Frank or Lili's, perhaps it is not linked at all. It does however draw the sadness birthed at the end of the novel out just a little longer and puts the relationship of Frank and Lili, Rapunzel and You into perspective. It brings out the flawed beauty of each and provides the ideal of love, unattainable except perhaps for in the realms of ourselves.
Rapunzel's story forms and resolves slowly as she, and we, learn about the events that lead up to her hospitalizaiton. At a certain point she begins to mention You. The reader or another, You are very important to Rapunzel and she did something very dire to attain You and which was the cause of her hospitalizaiton. You are home to Rapunzel, and in this foreign land her central desire is to get to you, to get home.
Frank and Lili are almost defined by their inability to function in society, but in very different ways and Hinton mirrors this in their narration. Lili's chapters are told in first person and this fits well as she is wracked by an introspective obsession. When the novel opens she is on a "good" day and seems like any other 20 somethings, a little lost in the world but otherwise okay: she creates a city of clothes in her room, visits with her "boyfriend" with whom she has a confusing and complicated relationship and worries about a meeting with her family. In fact both Lili and Frank obsess over imminent meetings with their families, and both groups are toxic in appropriately different ways to each, their influence driving both into their respective mental cages. As time goes on it becomes apparent that this "good day" is a rare one for Lili, a fluke, and her insecurities begin to come out in disastrous ways. Frank's narrative is told in the third person; he is apart from himself, unable to connect with his thoughts, emotions or the world around him. He seeks and coerces sex from Lili and his cousin and seems unable to feel affection, simply screwing to pass the time and branding himself as abusive (and rightfully so). Frank's entire post college goal amounts to playing with action figures for half an hour a day to become more childlike.
Navigating the hazy labyrinth between childhood and adulthood is a major theme of the novel. Frank and Lili are on the edge, either unsure or unable to commit to a stable adult life style. Along with Frank's action figure collection one night Lili takes cocaine with some friends and goes to a playground and meditates:
"I look around the playground. When is the last time I played on a playground? Why do people grow up and work and do things? I imagine a society by balancing their time between self-sustaining farms and playgrounds. You work a little, play a little. You hoe a little, you slide a little. Why doesn't this society exist? Why can't I be the leader of a society like this? I want my childhood back."
The childish genius, the naive clarity of this statement... Some of us entertain thoughts like this every day, for others of us the very notion is completely ludicrous. Lili continues:
"I am going to unlock some secret from my youth in this playground. The secret will help to understand my adult-self more maybe."
This is the thesis of the work, looking back to childhood to break through the barrier to adulthood, trying to find the spark that will carry one through the tedium and malaise of adult life. Lili and Frank are the casualties of this endeavor, and Hinton closes the novel before we ever learn whether they are successful or not. In a similar vein Rapunzel describes her first "awakening" in the hospital as a birth and she is cared for yet confined, much like as in childhood. At a certain point Rapunzel finds herself alone, yet free to do as she pleases and takes the first steps into the outside world. She describes this as a second birth: her attainment of a symbolic adulthood. Rapunzel attains what Frank and Lili fear and hope for and her story spirals off into a poetic journey into the heart of her forsaken country and ends ambiguously, at her darkest moment an apparent redemption arrives, perhaps.
I felt a distinct sadness at the end of Frank, Lili's and Rapunzel's stories. Not a sadness for the characters themselves but that undefinable sadness one may feel as a really good journey ends, as you realize that the place you have been for the last few days or months is not and never has been real. The sadness that the world of the novel, no matter how flawed and dark was an almost realer place than the one we experience during waking life. I found this novel to be quite personal, Hinton allows enough room for the reader to fill in gaps and unconscionably make it their own.
The final episode in Action/Figure is distinctly separate from the other two stories and follows a boy and a girl who eternally walk along an isolated shore. The prototypical love story: just two people finding solace in each other amongst the waste of the world. Perhaps this story is a dream or hallucination of Frank or Lili's, perhaps it is not linked at all. It does however draw the sadness birthed at the end of the novel out just a little longer and puts the relationship of Frank and Lili, Rapunzel and You into perspective. It brings out the flawed beauty of each and provides the ideal of love, unattainable except perhaps for in the realms of ourselves.
January 31, 2013
Action, Figure is a book about waiting. It tells one purgatorial story three different ways but does so in a way that doesn’t lazily rely on the ennui aesthetic. Frank Hinton knows enough to generously pepper in some mystery in order to keep the pages turning.
Opening with a closed first person narrative is a smart way to set the tone: an ambient painting of rebirth, a contextless story about human instinct, physical pain and what ties us to identity, the, “you” a carrot dangling from a stick.
Lili’s first person narrative grounds the reader by reminding us that most of our living is done within our own heads and that it’s mostly safe there and beautiful. And that it’s only when we think about seeing ourselves mirrored in the eyes of the ones we’re connected to (family), that the panic sets it. It’s a story of expectations and promises.
Frank’s third person narrative is similar to Lili’s(sex being the only real difference). They inhabit the same space metaphorically and physically; awareness cultivated internally that can’t seem to translate into the external environment. There is also the sense of impending doom in Frank's story and, again, it seems to deal mainly with family holding up mirrors.
This book does a great job blending modern blue-collar language with timeless, exquisitely crafted metaphor. We recognize that this is a world we live in (with dirt, drugs, sex, money, time that won’t stop) but we’re also granted privileged access into a more sentient reality (borderline hyperreality) that reminds us that sometimes we can make electricity out of all of this shit.
Action, Figure is a new form of alternative energy technology that makes electricity out of dirt and human shit.
“I check my phone. No messages. I make new texts. I send messages to friends from high school. I send a message to a guy I forgot is dead. The messages go to space and return. The messages go to heaven and are unanswered.”
“He thought of complex things that didn’t make sense. He saw flesh colored frost crystals, feminine fractals spreading vein like along a masculine surface. He thought of women made of rose glass, women frozen in orbs with curlicues that you could fit inside of your mouth, ones to suck like candy, dissolve into yourself.”
Opening with a closed first person narrative is a smart way to set the tone: an ambient painting of rebirth, a contextless story about human instinct, physical pain and what ties us to identity, the, “you” a carrot dangling from a stick.
Lili’s first person narrative grounds the reader by reminding us that most of our living is done within our own heads and that it’s mostly safe there and beautiful. And that it’s only when we think about seeing ourselves mirrored in the eyes of the ones we’re connected to (family), that the panic sets it. It’s a story of expectations and promises.
Frank’s third person narrative is similar to Lili’s(sex being the only real difference). They inhabit the same space metaphorically and physically; awareness cultivated internally that can’t seem to translate into the external environment. There is also the sense of impending doom in Frank's story and, again, it seems to deal mainly with family holding up mirrors.
This book does a great job blending modern blue-collar language with timeless, exquisitely crafted metaphor. We recognize that this is a world we live in (with dirt, drugs, sex, money, time that won’t stop) but we’re also granted privileged access into a more sentient reality (borderline hyperreality) that reminds us that sometimes we can make electricity out of all of this shit.
Action, Figure is a new form of alternative energy technology that makes electricity out of dirt and human shit.
“I check my phone. No messages. I make new texts. I send messages to friends from high school. I send a message to a guy I forgot is dead. The messages go to space and return. The messages go to heaven and are unanswered.”
“He thought of complex things that didn’t make sense. He saw flesh colored frost crystals, feminine fractals spreading vein like along a masculine surface. He thought of women made of rose glass, women frozen in orbs with curlicues that you could fit inside of your mouth, ones to suck like candy, dissolve into yourself.”
May 8, 2013
Frank Hinton makes the mistake all male writers make when trying to write from a female perspective: wish fulfillment. His female character is his wet dream. She is probably his actual roommate considering he didn't bother to change his own name. But I doubt if his roommate ever walked around in her underwear or kissed him or anything. Frank only wishes he had a roommate/ girlfriend this hot.
October 7, 2012
Fantastic characters, really good pacing ... feel like this book could be marketed by a big publisher as a brett-easton-ellis-y update on the disaffected millennial post-collegiate thing, but the characters feel realer and sadder than that, in a way i very much appreciated. Would be a great book to read in class or book group, i feel, due to its both being extremely readable but also dense and offering lots to discuss.
May 7, 2015
Awesome plot idea and striking, unique, brilliant writing style. The execution is messy at times but I find that completely forgivable thanks to Hinton's passion and artistry. Action, Figure is relevant and enjoyable to read. Made me feel things. Hinton is exceptionally talented and special.
October 4, 2012
My interview with the author is up now: http://www.vol1brooklyn.com/2012/10/0...
September 19, 2012
This is a beautiful story. Drugs, apologies and action figures. Finding out what love means. Being in that moment when a young person becomes an adult. Discovering oneself.
October 24, 2012
This book is absolutely beautiful.
January 11, 2013
stylistically draining
December 27, 2012
Interview forthcoming at Monkeybicycle, an imprint of Dzanc Books
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews