Mall by Eric Bogosian
Just read the book Mall by Eric Bogosian, who I’ve always liked, but mostly seen in other people’s work. I did see Talk Radio around 10 years ago, and it definitely made a much stronger impression than his appearances as an actor.
Mall starts with a character and scene that are altogether unpleasant and had me wondering if I wanted to continue reading, or put the book down and read something else. Then I spent the next two hours in uninterrupted reading.
Bogosian is at his best when he lays bare the interior monologues of his male characters. While the story flips between several points of view, the central character is revealed as Jeff:
Like a refugee on a forced march Jeff moved with the crowd. Everyone wants to be an individual. Everyone wants to wear special things and cut their hair in special ways and learn special lingo, so that they can be an individual. But there are too many slots to fill. The more individual everyone triies to be, the more alike they all are. Did I read that somewhere?
And I’m like them in almost every way. Why don’t I just admit it? I’m just a suburban boy propelled from nothing to nothing. But I’m also not. Deep down, I know that. From the outside, no one knows what I have inside, but that’s my secret. It’s a secret I have to keep. Because they don’t care anyway.
Jeff’s secret was that he knew he was a genius. he could feel it in his bones. Someday he would be a famous writer. He would pile words into vast mansions of thought and expression and the world would llook up at them with admiration and amazement.
Jeff didn’t get the highest grades in school, but that was because he knew grades were only a measure of spineless conformity. And fuck college. He didn’t have one hero who had a B.A., so who needed that shit? He’d get around to mastering style and coherence. Those things came with time. Technique was just a matter of practice. the important thing was insight and the wisdom you get from living life. That was what Jeff wanted to focus on. Living and loving and experiencing everything he could find. Make every second count.
Counterpoint to Jeff, full of uncertainty and future, is Mal, a speedfreak on a rampage:
Mal had an advantage over everyone else because he knew what he was going to do and they didn’t. He gazed out through his windshield and inhaled a Lucky.
This was all a person could ask for in life. To touch others, mess with their destiny. Otherwise a person just came and went, as if he were never alive in the first place.
Bogosian shows Mal as both logical and unhinged, understandable but not sympathetic:
A hot breeze grazed his cheek and his mind drifted. He sized up his situation. He was one hundred and seventy-five pounds of human organism. But he was not cooperating with the big bullshit game. He was not one more worker bee, he was not obeying the rules. He was breaking the rules. He was causing havoc. He was killing. When the big guys did it - the companies and the governments - nobody gave a shit. Only the little guys weren’t allowed to kill. Big rule. Big rule.
Bogosian’s pacing and pitch are perfect - the story is dark and modern and doesn’t overreach. It’s a quick read but a powerful one. Certainly not for everyone (a story about a spree killer, it’s filled with violence and sex and compulsive behavior), but for those who like darker stories it’s well-crafted and compelling.
