Bad Jobs and Poor Decisions

October 15, 2017
Helton (The Jugheads, 2014, etc.) wanders through a series of reminiscences of drugged states, dead-end jobs, and "writing feverishly," trying to make it as an author. In this memoir--labeled as such even though the author has altered his name as well as those of his associates and added fictional incidents--Helton roughly follows "Jake" from 1983, when he dropped out of the University of Texas, until 1989, when he re-enrolled. Two threads unite the episodic narrative: the narrator's stumbling into and out of a number of menial jobs, which allow the constant consumption of marijuana and other drugs, and his unhappy relationship with his wife, Susan. The sections of the story about his jobs painting industrial buildings, picking up railroad ties for future sale, and selling pumpkins and turf from the side of a road have a certain rough charm even if he sometimes seems to be slumming. Quick sketches of fellow workers, such as the "long-haired-loser-hillbilly-racist" who assisted Helton in painting a baptismal pool with "poisonous epoxy," are minidramas in themselves, and the author demonstrates that he was self-aware enough to recognize the detriments of constantly remaining high. The thread involving his ex-wife is less compelling and seems motivated more by a desire for literary revenge than for a true understanding of their relationship. Susan goes from a fellow high schooler with an "insatiable sex drive" (the results of which Helton describes in excruciating detail) to a cheating, lying harpy against whom Helton has the final word. Throughout, the prose is hampered by the author's frequent use of overly familiar words like "nice" and "fun." It's possible that Helton has deliberately assumed a flat, disaffected tone and a drab vocabulary, but it's difficult to discern the purpose, and many readers will be turned off by the degenerate characters and the author's inability to describe his life with precision. A series of scattered "dispatches" that fail to cohere.

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November 15, 2017
Helton (The Jugheads, 2014) titles this memoir of his life in Texas in 1989 accurately; both he and his new wife, Susan, fill their marriage with bad jobs and poor decisions. After one modest publication, Helton drops out of college and begins an extended alcohol-and-drug bender barely supported by work that exhausts him, keeps him in problematic company, and costs him half a thumb. He paints commercial property. He hauls and stacks wood. He collects railroad ties into flatbeds with his brother. The beat-down that Reaganomics visited on Texas' poorer classes is on full display here. Susan likewise struggles with meaningless work, substance abuse, and bad boundaries. Their challenging marriage structures this memoir, but the showpiece of Helton's story is his account of trying and failing to make a life by working hard labor for less than living wages. The dialogue Helton captures from his coworkers and bosses is authentic and wrenching. Readers will enjoy the clear eyes with which Helton looks back on himself and the late 1980s, when nothing was clear.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2017, American Library Association.)