Look Down, This is Where it Must Have Happened

by Hal Niedzviecki

The acclaimed author of The Peep Diaries and Hello, I'm Special returns to fiction, and delivers a mind-altering collection of short stories that confront the hypocrisies, humiliations and hilarities of modern life. The foibles of the 21st-century ego are on full view in this romp through social conventions—imaginative, offbeat stories that confront society's intractable dilemmas and deftly capture the zeitgeist of our fractured times. *An undergraduate gets in way over his head when a class assignment to start a terrorist organization goes viral *A pregnant 10th-grader struggles with her fetus's insistence that she abort him before both their lives are ruined. *A man trying to come to terms with the death of a friend becomes obsessed with a funeral home's online braodcasts. *A mortgage broker gets lost between the Web and the real world in pursuit of a pornography-induced fantasy. Look Down, This is Where It Must Have Happened is a biting satire of nostalgia, a send-up of the way highschool-era friendships can permanently choke off the possibility of adulthood. "Witty and wise."— San Francisco Chronicle "An equally gifted fiction writer and social critic."— Tikkun "There's tons of talent here."— NOW Magazine "Hal Niedzviecki is a remarkable writer."—Margot Livesey, author of The House on Fortune Street

Genres: Fiction, Short Stories

152 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 2011

About the author

Hal Niedzviecki is a writer, culture commentator and editor whose work challenges
preconceptions and confronts readers with the offenses of everyday life. Hal works in both the fiction and nonfiction genres. He is the author
of books including, in fiction, the novel Ditch, and his latest novel The Program. In nonfiction, his most recent work is The Peep Diaries: How We're Learning To Love Watching Ourselves and Our Neighbors (www.peepdiaries.com). He is the
current fiction editor and the founder of Broken Pencil, the magazine of zine culture and
the independent arts ( www.brokenpencil.com). He edited the magazine from 1995 to
2002. Hal’s writing has appeared in newspapers, periodicals and journals across North
America including the Utne Reader, the Globe and Mail, the National Post, Toronto Life,
Walrus, Geist, and This Magazine. He was the recipient of the Alexander Ross Award for
Best New Magazine Writer at the 1999 National Magazine Awards and has presented his
work at events across North America including the International Festival of Authors in
Toronto. Once dubbed the “guru of independent/alternative action” by the Toronto Star,
Niedzviecki is committed to exploring the human condition through provocative fiction
and non-fiction that charts the media saturated terrain of ever shifting multiple identities
at the heart of our fragmenting age. For excerpts, reviews, samples of past articles and
more, visit Hal’s website: www.smellit.ca

Reviews

[City Lights Booksellers & Publishers · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Fiction writer, social critic, and founding editor of indie literary magazine Broken Pencil Hal Niedzviecki has done it all. He has built his reputation on his ability to smartly skewer social conventions, picking apart aspects of our culture and revealing their absurdities. In his latest book, Look Down, This Is Where It Must Have Happened, Niedzviecki turns again to fiction, with a collection of 13 short stories that are both topical and timely. From terrorism to abortion, the subjects he grapples with are at the forefront of the public consciousness, as though ripped straight from today’s blog posts, Twitter feeds, and status updates." --Paul J. Comeau, Verbicide

"With dark humor and deep compassion, Niedzviecki, cultural critic and author of 'The Peep Diaires' (2009), delivers a haunting collection peopled by characters on the verge of despair. . . . Like David Means' stories, these convention-defying examples written in tight, punchy prose examine the fine lines between love and obsession, failure and success. A moving and amusingly varied collection."
--Booklist

[Michael Adubato · Rating 1 out of 5]

I usually enjoy books published by City Lights. Well, there had to be a boring, terrible one eventually and I found it. The first story was OK. The next one, a bit worse. I honestly cannot read more than a few pages and not start falling asleep. He has a strange style, but I can handle that. But it's trying to tell these stories that doesn't work. Sometimes confusing, never entertaining. I love to read but finishing this one was a struggle.

I went to Amazon.com and saw a couple of positive comments about the book too but they were publications, not your average person who reads for fun. There has to be a reason why the book is selling for only four dollars.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

I received this book as part of the Goodreads First Reads program.

This is a bit out there in terms of writing style from the sort of thing I usually read, but that was a good thing in this case. I like keeping a bit of variety in my reading habits. I do keep up with a lot of contemporary and literary fiction, but Niedzviecki's alluring style of prose drew me in from the first story in this collection.

All of the stories in Look Down... examine modern life in a creative manner. Some stories hooked me more than others, and I'm sure the meaning of a couple flew right over my head. Each story features characters straddling the lines of sanity in a variety of situations. My favorites were probably "Prenatal," in which a tweenage girl is constantly confronted by her fetus in a story that kept drawing me to think of the infamous talking turd in Franzen's The Corrections and "The Useless," a thought-provoking tale examining the sort of people who complain about the laze or lack in skill of others while not really doing much of anything themselves. Really, all of us engage in at least a mild sort of hypocrisy when it comes to those manners of things.

Overall, a pleasant diversion that provides some food for thought for quite some time after reading.

[Gary · Rating 5 out of 5]

i had never read anything by hal niedzviecki so thanks city lights for the chance as i was a first reads winner. the book keeps the 5 star rating i gave as pre-read based on promptness of getting book. the author is a fantastic writer and can not say enough for the way his mind works and the way all of the stories moved along so fast. there was a little confusion as table of contents had stories ending on different page from where they actually ended and the stories, especially the first one about terrorism, just ended so fast that i thought some pages were missing and had my wife read the story and she agreed and then had my daughter, kyria, read it and she thought so also. even with the endings of the stories that came after the first one just kept lingering in my mind. i guess everyone needs to buy the book and read it and see for yourself. now that should get me a free book or two from city lights and i do love signed copies.seriously it was excellent book and i enjoyed it very much.

[David Lester · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hal Heidzviecki has written a short-story collection about lost souls haggard by time and place. The weary wisdom of the young artist: “We live in peculiar times. I haven’t given up on understanding them. There are elections but nobody votes. There are political parties but they all promise the same thing. Why not? We are simple people. We want what they promise.” The prose is direct and energetic, and at times, heroic in its depictions of the ordinary, “The whiskers his wife shaves gently each morning have sprouted, yellowing needles of grass pushing up.” Heidzviecki has managed to deftly write about contemporary times, but from a distance, which gives this collection levity and depth.

[Victoria · Rating 3 out of 5]

Really interesting writing... I personally get peeved at a lack of punctuation (particularly quotation marks for dialogue), but I surprisingly got past that and really enjoyed the stories. They tended to throw you in abruptly and pull you out just as fast, but it was a good trip regardless.

[YYY]

Thank you First Reads for winning this free book. Hope to read and review soon.

[Michelle · Rating 3 out of 5]

Creative, well-written.

[Brett · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some good stories, some that I didn't understand, and some that started out promisingly and then fizzled away disappointingly.