Essays and Fictions

December 1, 2018
Canadian artist Phillips dives deeper into his trademark subject matter in this new collection of short stories and personal narratives. Phillips explores suicidal ideation, drug addiction, sex addiction, sexual attraction to teenagers, depression, therapy, and trauma in a series of nearly a dozen short-form meditations. His prose reads like a masculine grunt, brash and id-driven. The pieces take on a few different formats. One is an unanswered Craigslist post, another is a proposal for a medical memoir, a third is a series of deleted scenes from the lives of his parents?vignettes of what their lives might have been like had they not conceived children. The lines between fact and fiction become totally blurred throughout, morphing Phillips the writer into a much more elusive character. The graphic and disturbing imagery takes the stories to an elevated place, beyond a journey through human behavior. and into an enlightened study of Phillips' soul. His recklessness, candor, and detailed analysis of life's seedier underbelly are perfect for fans of Lolita and David Foster Wallace.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2018, American Library Association.)