Bad Teeth

by Dustin Long

Four interlocking narratives set in four American cities form a richly comic feast about love, academia, an elusive Tibetan novelist―and SOFA, a protest group so mysterious its very initials are open to interpretation. Bad Teeth follows a cast of young literary men and women, each in a period of formation, in four very American cities―Brooklyn, Bloomington, Berkeley, and Bakersfield. A Pynchonesque treat, it’s four (or more) books in a bohemian satire, a campus comedy, a stoner’s reverie, and a quadruple love story. The plots coalesce around the search for a mysterious author, Jigme Drolma (“the Tibetan David Foster Wallace”), who might in fact be a plagiarist. But how does the self-styled arch-magician Nicholas Bendix figure into this? What will happen when SOFA unleashes the “Apocalypse”? And what’s to become of Lump, the cat?

Genres: Fiction

320 pages, Paperback

First published March 25, 2014

Reviews

[karen · Rating 3 out of 5]

okay, i was really enjoying this the whole way through, but i was a bit let down by the ending.

it is a very self-conscious book, and very very funny. if you think omphaloskepsis is funny. and i happen to. it's a cheeky story that takes place in four b-cities: brooklyn, bloomington, berkeley, and bakersfield, full of egotistical young adult hipster types who are struggling with relationships and self-discovery, solipsism and drugs and the dilemmas of translation, all overshadowed by a mysterious countercultural protest group whose philosophies are vague at best; changing the entire fabric of ideaspace ftlog, but who rally around an enigmatic and charismatic leader named viv la revolution under whose influence they will leave their mark in a big way. i mean, apparently.

Bad Teeth: A Novel actually has a lot in common with Infinite Jest, both structurally and thematically. structurally it's an easy scan - the story is told through a variety of different viewpoints, all revolving around a central character who is mythological in stature and far-reaching in influence but only briefly revealed on paper. there are connections between all of the characters; some known, some removed by a degree of separation, and their stories slide over each other through the device of an omniscient narrator whose identity is not revealed until partway through the narrative, as he asserts his own voice through the intrusion of footnotes. also - acronyms. also-also, this text has been written after a catastrophic event that is alluded to throughout, and the book is chronicling events leading up to this climax, this conclusion, which never actually happens within the story itself. add this to the fact that IJ is mentioned once explicitly and that jigme drolma, the mysterious author whose work is whispered about through all of these stories, is known as the Tibetan David Foster Wallace and baby, you got a stew going.



thematically, the similarities occur in characters who are incredibly lonely intellectual and pseudo-intellectual types, anesthetizing themselves with drugs and alcohol in order to avoid the vulnerability of relationships while still yearning for human contact and meaning. they are self-conscious and self-reflective; those very stoned or very immature young adult types who spend their time thinking about shit that seems so revelatory and clever at the time, like comparing the feelings of different kinds of love to the highs of different drugs, but are really just smug antisocial excuses for not taking action, and stalling their way through life.

At this point in his life, Judas was one of those vague young men on the verge of no longer being young, now in his midthirties, whose sense of purpose in life had been too long dependent on early promise, and who was only just beginning to realize that this promise had been rescinded; he was still defining himself in terms of what he might become rather than in terms of what he was, but he was beginning to learn.

yeah, like that.

but the text continuously pokes fun at these characters for their self-indulgences:

He went away feeling sorry for himself: seeing himself as Candide and wondering why he had even bothered moving here. But the reader shouldn't feel too sorry for him, as he was ignoring all of the times in his life when he had been the one who had acted like a total dick to someone else. He tended to express his aggression more passively than Walter and his friends, of course, but at least they were open about who they were. Judas, on the other hand, pretended even to himself that he was sweet, romantic, and innocent when in fact he was just as competitive, lustful, and petty as any of them. Which is to say that he kind of deserved to have his finger broken.

which i think is fun.

and there are the same kind of dizzying monologues as in IJ:

"Yeah, well. It's just that you get this one little piece of clout and they treat you as if you're some sort of authority, and for a second you start to believe it, and so you end up coming across as all pontificatory, you know?…But then if you start worrying too much about that shit, it gets even worse. It becomes like this false modesty thing, where you're like, 'I have to pretend I'm not as great as everyone thinks I am, otherwise I'll seem like I'm full of myself.' But then that ends up being the real sign that you've bought into your own hype, when you feel like you have to hide it…You read my first story, so I know that you're going to look at my new one in relation to that. You have expectations about who I am and how I write. And I can't help that, I guess - I mean, there's nothing I can really do about it - but I can't let it bother me either. So yeah, you know, the new one is completely different from the first one. But then that's a choice, too. I mean, do i deliver a known quantity and position myself as a niche writer, just doing this one thing well, over and over; or do I risk alienating my established audience by trying something new? It's like, that question is always there, but it's a question that you can't let yourself worry about. Or it's a decision that you have to make without worrying about all of the repercussions, at least with regard to that particular question. I mean, you have to make the decision for entirely separate reasons.

which the leads into this "oh no you didn't" punchline

"If I actually have to summarize it in a single sentence, I guess I'll say that it's about Ludwig Wittgenstein lacking the words to express his love for a young Cambridge mathematician. But that makes it sound pretentious, you know, when for me - even though it's about a language philosopher - it's not really about language or philosophy; it's about the emotional core. I mean, to be totally honest, even though I obviously don't expect anyone to get this, for me it's about my twin brother, Isaac."

and the former english major undergrad in me stifles a snort of recognition. which is repeated every time the words "objective correlative" are used. which is *spoiler alert* a lot.

there are also a lot of jabs taken at interpretation - of books and films within the book, dreams, diary entries and unsent letters, student stories, all of which are very revealing and also a hoot. and some really funny parts about the woes of academia in the clash of wealthy-and-disgruntled parents vs. university faculty.

but there are also less funny passages about the inherent loneliness to the act of both reading and writing, and the chasm of communication which occurs between people who are too self-involved:

The conversation was awkward. They both had things to say to the other, but they had trouble with the diction. Caissa was halfway annoyed that she even had to deal with her own uncertain emotions when she would have preferred to put all of this energy into her book. Judas, meanwhile, was focused in wondering whether he would be able to engineer some other opportunity to sleep with her and thus cement what he hoped might become a real and meaningful relationship, though he couldn't think of anything that wouldn't come off as desperate. So, instead, they spoke mostly of other people…

or too woefully analytical:

Part of Adam suspected that his suspicion that he might be an alcoholic was just a way of trying to make himself seem more interesting: that telling Judas about it was a misguided attempt to sound mysterious and cool. But another part of him suspected that this skeptical analysis of the situation was just the alcoholism's way of trying to hide itself.

or too defeated:

…he found that his ambitions had diminished in other areas, as well. Where he'd once dreamt of finding his one great love, now his thoughts on that subject didn't reach beyond getting back to Brooklyn and having sex with Caissa again - or for Caissa to love him, and tell him that she loved him, even if they didn't end up together forever. And beyond all of this, he wasn't sure what any of his next goals should be - what he would have in his life immediately worth living for.

but okay, enough quoting, sheesh.

i really enjoyed this, and it was a four-star from the outset, but i found the ending to be very abrupt and jarring, which disappointed me into a half-star demotion. later today, i am going to reread/skim the book to see if i missed something that justifies this abruptness, but for now, i am going to say 3.5.

nope! i reread the whole thing, and i still feel a little blindsided by the whole ending-thing. however, and i know i said no more quotes, but i came across another passage i liked for its last-line ball-punch, so i leave you with:

But here it is, my big idea: the loss of a loved one is always pretty much the same. Or, that's not the realization, but it's sort of a corollary of the realization. But regardless of whether the reason you lose someone is because your love is unrequited, she leaves you for a neighborhood, or just because the person dies - and whether you're talking about a parent, a lover, or a friend - they're all sort of the same. The particulars allow for some shading of intensity, it's true, but the worst part is always the same. You feel as if you can't possibly get along without the person - and in a way you're right; the person you are at the moment that you think this is more or less defined by the attachment you have - but the hardpan truth of it is that time will make you into someone else, someone who can get along without that person, no matter how much you don't want it to. So the really traumatic thing is all nine instances - multiplying the three types of failure by the three types of relationships, though I don't mean to say that's the extent of the possibilities - isn't the loss of the other person; it's the loss of yourself. And it seems like the end of the world because it is - but only this world. The pain you feel - the pain that wakes you nauseated by your own gut-doubling sobs - it's the pain of birthing someone into another world. Someone other than you who couldn't exist without that love. So, you know, for what it's worth: happy birthday.

come to my blog!

[Corey · Rating 5 out of 5]

A funny, well-written, meticulously plotted novel, and my introduction to the work of Dustin Long (I've yet to read Icelander, but I probably will soon). I've heard a lot of comparisons of this books to Pynchon and to Infinite Jest, but in a lot of ways it reminded me of The Broom of The System. The biting humor, the exploration of constructed meaning (culminating in some pretty nihilistic conclusions), the self-conscious-but-not-overly-pretentious style... And I mean all of that as an enormous compliment, as I'm quite a fan of The Broom of The System.

Maybe I'll write more about this book later, but Karen's review is already pretty great, and besides, I'm tempted to avoid blemishing this fine novel by talking about it too much.

[Riley · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great book

[Kinsey_m · Rating 2 out of 5]

It pains me to give 2 stars to a novel by Dustin Long, since Icelander is one of my favourite novels and an inspiration to me as an aspiring writer. I will also add that I have only read 3/4 of the book, but frankly, I'm losing the will to go on (and if the book was by another writer I'd have given up long ago).

So, what's wrong with Bad Teeth? Not the writing. The writing at the sentence and paragraph level is excellent. It is the story-telling that doesn't work.

At different points during the novel, the characters think or discuss ideas that one can imagine that are Long's own opinions or thoughts. In particular, a writer who has had great success with a first short story explains how she reacted to that and how it affected her subsequent work, how she had to choose between doing something similar and make readers happy, or make something different and risk alienating her readers(her final choice). While I think that doing something different shows bravery, I'd say that there a lot of similitudes between Bad teeth and Icelander:

- There is a McGuffin: The Tibetan writer that Judas is looking for and that may or may not be involved with the activist group SOFA. Sadly, Judas himself (or any other characters) don't seem to be that interested in the McGuffin, so it is difficult for the reader to become insterested in it.

- There are different points of view, however they don't provide great constrast with regards to what is happening, and even the characters themselves don't feel that different from each other.

- Footnotes are used to give some background. The footnotes are written by the narrator, a witness to the events. We don't know who that is until we are well into the story.

The sad thing is that Bad Teeth had the elements to become a very interesting story, but it has some major flaws (always from my opinion):

- I can deal with unsympathethic characters, the problem is when characters don't want or care about anything (even if it is world dominaton). How am I supposed to be emotionally invested in the love lives of these characters, or their professional aspirations if they are not that interested themselves?

- There is no tension. There are some references to the SOFA apocalypse, but given the nature of SOFA, we don't know if that is of any real consequence. Moreover, the Tibetan writer/SOFA themes do not seem to be an integral part of the rest of the story, as the characters are not paying any real attention to them for at least 3/4 of the book (and I don't know about the last quarter). They merely seem as an excuse to move the characters from one room to another, one city to another. It may be that in the last quarter of the novel this results in some changes in the characters themselves, but I may not have the strength of will to find out. While I doubt that Long will ever write a plot-based book, tension, pace and tightness are still important, and while a slow pace may suit some books (and some of my favourite novels are slow-paced), it doesn't benefit this one.

I'll end this review by saying that I think that Dustin Long is a very talented writer with a great career ahead of him, and that experimenting will always have its risks. Although I know it must be terrible to have your books compared to an earlier work, I'd say that what Icelander had that Bad Teeth is missing, is that in the former case, Long was able to translate the great story he had in his mind onto the page, while with Bad teeth I can feel that the idea in his mind may have been very good, but what is finally on the book is not that great.

[Denise Huntington · Rating 3 out of 5]

I received "Bad Teeth: A Novel" by Dustin Long in a Goodreads giveaway in exchange for my review of the book.

Just to put my review in context, I am a 62 year old retired software engineer. A woman. I am a very eclectic reader and will read a book from any genre as long as it holds my interest.

"Bad Teeth" is a book with four parts. Each part focuses on one character and takes place in one city: Berkeley, Bloomington, Brooklyn, and Bakersfield. The characters in each part interact with characters in other parts so the parts are not independent of one another. The overall theme seems to be the difficulty of single, young adults in the literary world to form relationships. Underlying all the stories is a mysterious organization, called SOFA, that drives certain characters' philosophies of life even though you never really find out what SOFA stands for. The leader or originator of SOFA is also rather mysterious and each character has a different idea of who he is or is trying hard to track him down to understand what he stands for.

I had a hard, hard time getting through Part 1. I could not identify at all with the sub-culture of literati hipsters in New York. The characters all seemed narcissistic and disconnected from real life and each other. That world is not one I know nor am I interested in it. However, I plowed on into Part 2.

By the time I was about halfway through Part 2, I grew more interested in the plot and the characters. From there, the book went pretty quickly. I liked the satire (and irony) in the book and I think it is very well written. I did not, however, care for the ending.

Did I ever relate to the characters or their pitiful little stories? No. Do I think the book is well-written? Yes, I do. Do I think the book has an audience? Yes. But it is probably not little old retired ladies from the southwest U.S. I'm sure that those who work in the publishing world or in academia will appreciate it more than I.

Overall, I'd give this book a 3-star rating.

[Kandace · Rating 2 out of 5]

Author
Dustin Long

Publication Date
March 25, 2014

Synopsis
From Goodreads: Four interlocking narratives set in four American cities form a richly comic feast about love, academia, an elusive Tibetan novelist — and SOFA, a protest group so mysterious its very initials are open to interpretation.

Bad Teeth follows a cast of young literary men and women, each in a period of formation, in four very American cities — Brooklyn, Bloomington, Berkeley, and Bakersfield. A Pynchonesque treat, it’s four (or more) books in one: a bohemian satire, a campus comedy, a stoner’s reverie, and a quadruple love story. The plots coalesce around the search for a mysterious author, Jigme Drolma (“the Tibetan David Foster Wallace”), who might in fact be a plagiarist. But how does the self-styled arch-magician Nicholas Bendix figure into this? What will happen when SOFA unleashes the “Apocalypse”? And what’s to become of Lump, the cat?

High Points
Long has written, deftly, about the uncertain times of the human life when we find ourselves in limbo. Between jobs, between loves, between college and the real world. It is in these times we are looking hardest for something to stand for, even when that something is vague or elusive.

Low Points
I, personally, could not connect to the story or the characters. There was a certain amount of arrogance and self-importance to most of these characters that kept me at arm's length.

You'll love it if...
...you are interested in academia. The world of academics has a very specific feel; Long captures it.

Overall
2 stars

EGalley received from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. FOr more reviews by The Readist, please visit www.thereadist.com.

[Rebecca · Rating 2 out of 5]

The blurb for this novel sounded irresistible, but I quickly decided it wasn’t for me. Judas has moved from California to NYC to pursue his work as a translator of Chinese fiction. At the start of Part One, he attends a literary magazine launch party and learns a bit more about his next translation project – “the Tibetan David Foster Wallace.” But all that happens in the first 50 pages is him recounting the plots of various novels and films he comes across. One of the books is Challah-caust, by one Walter Benjamin (but not the Walter Benjamin). And on it goes, this über-clever, postmodern metafiction.

After I gave up I had a peek at the last few pages and was unsurprised to learn that...pretty much nothing had actually happened. The setup is uncannily similar to Ned Beauman’s Glow, too: an opening party scene, where the main character meets an exotic female with a strange name starting with a C; an Asian country taking a major role. I’ve already read one book with that formula this year, and wasn’t too keen on it, so there seemed little point in trying another. (Shame I never found out what the title referred to, though.)

[Oriana]

How is it possible that a book being compared to BOTH Broom of the System and Infinite Jest was published like three months ago and I am only finding out about it now??

[Curt · Rating 4 out of 5]

Meandering by design, but a nice finish.

[Joe Kraus · Rating 2 out of 5]

One annoying thing about hipster novels – as a genre – is that they imply a community of conversation that you, as the reader, are closed off from. And the basic rhetoric of the hipster is to leave large elements unexplained while focusing instead on the mundane. (The classic instance of that, of course, comes in Pulp Fiction when the hitmen, on their way to kill a group of teenagers for reasons not worth explaining, have a passionate debate about Big Mac and foot rubs.)

One beguiling thing about hipster novels is that they give the impression they represent the vanguard of a new way of seeing the world. They’re the organs of the next wave of culture, and they carry the promise that this different weighting of what warrants attention will matter in time to come. Andy Warhol, for instance, elevated the Campbell’s Soup can to iconic status, in part, because he was commenting on the nature of superficiality – on the role of image in contemporary culture – and he turned about to be powerfully prescient.

Somehow, I don’t think Dustin Long is all that prescient. The opening section here has a nice tone, and I enjoyed the unfolding of Judas’s drive to translate a novel by an obscure Tibetan writer. I understand that the subsequent sections are supposed to comment on the action of that first part by transposing the ‘drama’ to other cities that are tangentially related, but I found the holes between the stories distracting. Don’t tell us the end of Judas’s story if you don’t want to, but don’t imply that it’s unfinished state is somehow the point. That sounds like an insight that seemed profound when you were stoned but pedestrian when you sobered back up.

I’d spend more time contemplating the nature of the interconnectedness and the deliberate gaps of the book if what we had were better written. Instead, these characters have little self-awareness and often mere two-dimensionality. Sela is supposedly a humanities graduate student. Instead of contemplating her circumstances with the tools of her field or through the lens of some hard-won understanding, she writes in a journal as if she were a teenage girl. Even worse, she writes in the form of letters to the boyfriend she left behind. From a male writer, that seems like the worst type of cliché, the woman who secretly wants him even as she has told him otherwise.

This feels like a novel that wants to be meaningful. It cites philosophers every so often – in that lazy hipster way – but it doesn’t seem to have a sustained philosophical point. It may be an insight that even the most thoughtful of people is still embodied, still horny, but that’s hardly an original one. When we do finally meet our obscure novelist, he’s a smooth talker who’s always on the make. There’s no sign of what might make him worthy of contemplation, nothing like the suffering and deep experience of Roberto Bolano’s Archimbaldi in 2666, or – to go to my personal favorite chestnut – the sustained writer’s block of Mordecai Richler’s Moses Berger in Solomon Gursky was Here. He’s just an old man on the make, maybe even a plagiarist. It takes a substantial writer to imagine a substantial writer, and, from the evidence here, Long is not that substantial.

I suppose there may be a worthwhile ‘play’ of form here, and I can see how the unfinished stories, broken up by geography, make for an interesting formal experiment. But even there, Long sells this short by creating a genuine climax at the end, bringing his characters together in conventional ways. And that’s undercut still further by the adolescent nature of the general yearning here.

This one got me at the start, but it got more and more frayed as it went. I’d have bailed on it if I hadn’t been three quarters of the way through by the time I realized just how disappointed I was. It may be that I’m not hip enough for it, but I’m more inclined to think it’s simply all pose and no substance.

[Mike Heenan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very good writer and an enjoyable but arduous read. Slow first part but picks up nicely. Ending was a bit like he'd just run out of energy as the plot lines are left hanging, or maybe it's just me.

[Amanda · Rating 3 out of 5]

http://guninactone.wordpress.com/2014...

I don’t even know where to begin with this review. This book contains four parts as the story moves from Brooklyn, to Bloomington, back and forth in time to Berkley and ending in Bakersfield. As we begin Judas is attempting to find a Tibetan author in the hopes of translating his next novel. Maybe he’s a plagiarist, maybe he’s a brilliant author-who’s to tell? The book meanders all over the country from there. I enjoyed how the flow moved overall from perspective to perspective and time and place. There were a few direct interjections into the book of the author speaking directly to the reader and those I found to be somewhat jarring. It was enough for me to switch man to woman, drunk to sober, city to city. I did not need this additional break in the flow-though the snarky comments about his own characters did make me laugh. Such as:

He went away feeling sorry for himself: seeing himself as Candide and wondering why he had even bothered moving here. But the reader shouldn’t feel too sorry for him, as he was ignoring all of the times in his life when he had been the one who had acted like a total dick to someone else. He tended to express his aggression more passively than Walter and his friends, of course, but at least they were open about who they were. Judas, on the other hand, pretended even to himself that he was sweet, romantic, and innocent when in fact he was just as competitive, lustful, and petty as any of them. Which is to say that he kind of deserved to have his finger broken.

The synopsis calls the parts “ a bohemian satire, a campus comedy, a stoner’s reverie, and a quadruple love story” and while I would say I found all of these but the love story in Bad Teeth, I think this could all be summed up as a bohemian satire. The characters are full of self-importance and low on ambition. I don’t think I really found any love, but there was plenty of lust. I didn’t really connect with these characters, but I did enjoy them overall. The “Apocalypse” planned by SOFA (who are they?!) is referred to throughout but does not happen within the book which was kind of disappointing to me. I almost wish SOFA had been more fleshed, but I understand that would have also defeated Long’s purpose of the group.

I’m still not entirely sure what I read — and I am not satisfied I learned what became of Lump the cat! The reviews I have seen have readers displeased with the ending, but I liked the end. I felt I had enough resolution on the characters that I wanted to read about anyway. I felt this was worth a read for the laughs for sure, and there were some really thoughtful passages that I enjoyed. If you’re looking for something different to read, this is it.

Last thought-I love this cover! Just kind of cool!

3 stars.

Thank you NetGalley and New Harvest for this advanced copy for review.

[Elsa Reyes · Rating 3 out of 5]

More like 3.5

I won this book through the Goodreads First Reads program from Amazon publishing for an honest review.

This book is cut up into Brooklyn, Bloomington, Berkeley, and Bakersfield. The character Each section focuses on different characters that are interconnect with Judas being the main thread between most of the characters.

The first section Brooklyn was not very interesting. I couldn't connect with the character Judas. He seemed arrogant, purposeless, and judging. The book got better on and grew on me as I read the rest of the sections.

I really liked the main character of the Bloomington section, Adam. I really loved how he knew his flaws and was trying to work on it. He seemed real, vulnerable and nice.

Berkeley and Bakersfield I enjoyed because of how Selah starts out a wreck and then in the end realizes how many bad choices she is making and gets back on track in life.

I weirdly enjoyed more the made up stories this book referenced. I really wish the chess game story that Judas described was a fully fleshed out novel. I actually would be really interested in reading Adam’s book on alcohol as well.

Overall there were moments that really captivated me and entertained but I think the I would have enjoyed the book more if I had liked Judas as a character more and if all of the SOFA stuff the book mentions wasn't so vague.

Some people didn't like the ending but I liked the ending. Everyone in a way collided to that moment that Judas got hit in the mouth. Selah, Caissa, and Judas snapped out of bad habits and moved on to be productive and work on projects they were passionate about.

[Bekka · Rating 3 out of 5]

Thanks to Netgalley.com and HMH New Harvest for early access to this title.

I didn't really enjoy this book as much as I had hoped. I found the characters to be fairly pretentious and unlikable for the most part. However, the author is a brilliant writer, and some of the philosophical discussions which permeate the book are very intriguing. I did enjoy the way the characters individual stories were woven together, and quite liked the way these various threads merged at the end. I also found myself laughing in quite a few places, both from the situations and from the writing style. However, its rare that I read a book where I can't find at least one character whom I like, and care about. I am somewhat familiar with the world these characters inhabit, having gone to a big name school for graduate in a theory-driven field. I recognized these characters, but really couldn't bring myself to care much about them and their situations. I may be worth the read for the writing style and humor alone, and because the structure is so interesting.

[Aditi · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was also a book I got for free through Goodreads First Reads. Overall, this book is entertaining. The plot is obscure, perhaps on purpose or maybe by accident. However, the author displays sharp insight into human nature. The story is contemporary, and the characters are very real: they could easily be people I know. I was especially appreciative of the way the author articulated a lot of the confusion and uncertainty his characters experience, which almost seems like a theme of the book. While there isn't much to be learned from the story, I recommend reading the book for its characters, and its commentary on the life of young, irresponsible, "solipsistic" individuals. The author's reflections on human nature make up for the lack of a strong plot. Or perhaps it is due to the human nature of his characters that it is impossible for the book to have a plot. From the standpoint of storytelling, this book leaves much to be desired. Your call.

[Vicky Boackle · Rating 3 out of 5]

I just finished this book and feel I need to read it again to give it justice.This book is about a group of writers and the struggles they go through to get the job done,or not .These characters all have issues and ,sorry folks,they can be funny.They drink,party,have sex,do drugs while networking to achieve success.This is a slice of life way foreign to me but very interesting to read especially with the author's funny sense of humor.

[Dina · Rating 3 out of 5]

I both loved and hated this novel, which is why I'm giving it three stars. On one hand, none of the characters were likeable, it was incredibly pretentious, and not very interesting. But, I think the author was intending to be that way, so kudos for succeeding. On the other hand, it had enough beautifully written passages to make it worth reading.

[Jeff · Rating 4 out of 5]

A surprising but ultimately rewarding stylistic departure from the whimsy of his debut Icelanders, Bad Teeth is a witty, well-paced and engaging look into the intertwining lives of some aspiring literary wannabees.

Full Disclosure; the author and I were college friends and coworkers at Cal's campus bookstore. Yay Dustin!

[Pete Camp · Rating 5 out of 5]

Was a little apprehensive when I read the synopsis of the book and it is referred to as Pynchonesque. However, Dustin Long clearly has his own voice. He borrows themes from and references Pynchon’s Crying of Lot 49 but this is no plagiarism. Very clever interlocking stories and characters makes this a highly enjoyable read. Will be reading more of this exciting young author in the future.

[Bookend Family · Rating 1 out of 5]

I was not impressed with this book. Basically this book is about a writer than no one is sure if he exists. Add to that a bunch of grad students sitting around talking about everyday life and they all seem pretty crabby. Making this not very enjoyable for the reader.

[Gaije · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ambivalent about this one. Too clever for its own good, definitely.

[Travis Evans · Rating 1 out of 5]

Satire of easy targets + uninteresting self-consciousness that solves an even less interesting mystery. Lots of words that add up to very little substance.

[Clayton Cheever · Rating 3 out of 5]

Geeky, meta-literary fun.

[Carrie · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is written in four parts, the first was difficult for me to get through, the second picks up a bit but the ending wasn't my favorite. The story was lacking to keep my interest, but the book is well written and the humor at parts earned it a third star.

This was a goodreads giveaway win!