emily_amick's review
1.0
I feel like maybe there is something wrong with me for not liking this book. Miranda July's movies are so amazing, but this... I didn't like it at all. I wrote more here: https://booksnat.wordpress.com/2015/06/29/its-not-you-its-me-miranda-july-jeff-lemire-and-kazuo-ishiguro/
momma_nilsen's review
5.0
Please note: I read this book on an airplane, in the middle seat, with my boyfriend constantly prodding me "how it was". In truth, I kept telling him it was good and then brushing him off to leave me alone. This book should be read in the privacy of your house so you can relish in it's fantastic awkwardness and quirky internal behaviors.
I can not recommend this book to any one and I would also highly recommend this book to everyone. Reasons being that this is a crazy, fucked up, hell of a journey for one character to go through. It will make you blush, it will make you question your own sanity, it will gross you out, it will make you feel incredibly awkward, and most importantly it will give you an accurate description of what it's like when chaos meets order.
At first I had no clue what the heck this book was about. The title is very misleading because I thought it would be about a serial killer or a grizzly murder...but it's about a middle-aged woman. Say what?! Anyone who is anyone has had perverse thoughts about another human being, whether it be violence, sexuality, or anything else...let's be real, you've had some fucked up ideas wandering around your head. This book gives voice to that Freudian voice inside your mind that begs to be released from time to time and breathe in the open air. I can't help but use the word awkward continuously throughout this review because it is the best word to describe this novel. You are intruding into this woman's skull, into her inner most thoughts, and un-spooling her brain. It is so wonderfully weird.
I have been persnickety about books as of late because I have read some serious duds. I will never be the person who rates every book I read 5 stars because I love the critical nature of myself and holding high standards and expectations for my brain. I demand brilliance and the ability to be challenged dammit! This book did not disappoint because as soon as I was done I needed to research what this meant or what that meant. What was the point? This book is a giant metaphor for aggression v. passive natures, you could also say it's chaos v. order (which I've already stated - but it works so shut it). My diatribe on how brilliantly written this novel is just barely shadows in compassion to how beautifully intelligent this book is. Like I said, this book won't be for everyone...but I still think you should totally read it!
I can not recommend this book to any one and I would also highly recommend this book to everyone. Reasons being that this is a crazy, fucked up, hell of a journey for one character to go through. It will make you blush, it will make you question your own sanity, it will gross you out, it will make you feel incredibly awkward, and most importantly it will give you an accurate description of what it's like when chaos meets order.
At first I had no clue what the heck this book was about. The title is very misleading because I thought it would be about a serial killer or a grizzly murder...but it's about a middle-aged woman. Say what?! Anyone who is anyone has had perverse thoughts about another human being, whether it be violence, sexuality, or anything else...let's be real, you've had some fucked up ideas wandering around your head. This book gives voice to that Freudian voice inside your mind that begs to be released from time to time and breathe in the open air. I can't help but use the word awkward continuously throughout this review because it is the best word to describe this novel. You are intruding into this woman's skull, into her inner most thoughts, and un-spooling her brain. It is so wonderfully weird.
I have been persnickety about books as of late because I have read some serious duds. I will never be the person who rates every book I read 5 stars because I love the critical nature of myself and holding high standards and expectations for my brain. I demand brilliance and the ability to be challenged dammit! This book did not disappoint because as soon as I was done I needed to research what this meant or what that meant. What was the point? This book is a giant metaphor for aggression v. passive natures, you could also say it's chaos v. order (which I've already stated - but it works so shut it). My diatribe on how brilliantly written this novel is just barely shadows in compassion to how beautifully intelligent this book is. Like I said, this book won't be for everyone...but I still think you should totally read it!
beahoffman_'s review
1.0
This read as seriously cliche to me. The end!! Ugh. The end is the worst part of it all and that’s saying something
bellatora's review
1.0
If performance art turned itself into a book, it would be The First Bad Man. That means some people will sit in awe, applauding the brazen, raw energy that they feel pulsing from it. And other people (me) will awkwardly linger by a wall, trying to work up the courage to bolt.
This is the story of Cheryl, a woman who swallows down her feelings so much that she has a psychosomatic injury she calls a "globus hystericus" (I googled it, this is not a real thing. This book is not trying for anything resembling reality, so it doesn't matter, this is all symbolism). Because she can't stand up for herself, her bosses foist upon her their violent, vulnerable young daughter, Clee. Clee is a horror roommate, but her and Cheryl come to some kind of symbiotic relationship when they form a two-woman fight club. It feels incredibly predatory that a 40-something Cheryl begins a relationship with a woman half her age. Especially since for periods of the book Cheryl is acting as a surrogate mother to Clee. But don't worry, Cheryl's long-time crush is the even skeezier, older (60-something) Philip, a literal pedophile and for some reason makes Cheryl be the one to tell him he can have sex with a sixteen year old. It feels like Philip is made to be so predatory to make Cheryl seem innocent by comparison.
Cheryl is also obsessed with a baby she calls Kubelko Bondy - a soul who will appear in different babies and who she feels is "hers."
There are symbols and themes that are worked very clearly and blatantly into this novel - about control, and women being told by society to swallow down their self-expression, and lots of thoughts about gender - that seem to be the actual point of this book. This is not just sound and noise - there are bigger ideas and messages here. But while there were bits and bobs I enjoyed, and while this book had the edges of something that I wanted to explore more, the sheer absurdity of the book just drowned out the bigger ideas at play. Plus, I really, supremely disliked the last half, which almost felt like July splintered an entirely different book into this one. Really, I wish the first half of this book was the entire thing. Cut out the strange therapist-sex-games subplot. Cut it off after the fight club that transitioned to playing out absurd self-defense videos. Cut out Kubelko Bondy. Focus on a woman who forced herself to be passionless and precise and finally allowed herself to be loud and messy. There is a novella in here that I would have enjoyed with all its absurdity. But the longer it went on, the less I liked it.
This is the story of Cheryl, a woman who swallows down her feelings so much that she has a psychosomatic injury she calls a "globus hystericus" (I googled it, this is not a real thing. This book is not trying for anything resembling reality, so it doesn't matter, this is all symbolism). Because she can't stand up for herself, her bosses foist upon her their violent, vulnerable young daughter, Clee. Clee is a horror roommate, but her and Cheryl come to some kind of symbiotic relationship when they form a two-woman fight club. It feels incredibly predatory that a 40-something Cheryl begins a relationship with a woman half her age. Especially since for periods of the book Cheryl is acting as a surrogate mother to Clee. But don't worry, Cheryl's long-time crush is the even skeezier, older (60-something) Philip, a literal pedophile and for some reason makes Cheryl be the one to tell him he can have sex with a sixteen year old. It feels like Philip is made to be so predatory to make Cheryl seem innocent by comparison.
Cheryl is also obsessed with a baby she calls Kubelko Bondy - a soul who will appear in different babies and who she feels is "hers."
Spoiler
Don't worry, of course Cheryl is rewarded with Kubelko Bondy actually appearing in her life in the form of Clee's baby by Philip - and Clee conveniently exits stage left so Cheryl can finally be the full and only figure in Kubelko Bondy's life. Because that seems to be what the book is leading to - Cheryl having the baby she's wanted all her life.There are symbols and themes that are worked very clearly and blatantly into this novel - about control, and women being told by society to swallow down their self-expression, and lots of thoughts about gender - that seem to be the actual point of this book. This is not just sound and noise - there are bigger ideas and messages here. But while there were bits and bobs I enjoyed, and while this book had the edges of something that I wanted to explore more, the sheer absurdity of the book just drowned out the bigger ideas at play. Plus, I really, supremely disliked the last half, which almost felt like July splintered an entirely different book into this one.
Spoiler
And after all this exploration of feminism and gender, why this decision to make Cheryl's entire purpose in life being about being a mother. Not that being a mother can't be a fulfilling, wonderful experience for a woman. But this very modern book seemed to veer swiftly into a traditional view.cherylcheng00's review
4.0
But as the sun rose I crested the mountain of my self-pity and remembered I was always going to die at the end of this life anyway. What did it really matter if I spent it like this—caring for this boy—as opposed to some other way? I would always be earthbound; he hadn't robbed me of my ability to fly or to live forever. I appreciated nuns now, not the conscripted kind, but modern women who chose it. If you were wise enough to know that this life would consist mostly of letting go of things you wanted, then why not get good at the letting go, rather than the trying to have?
fatmaahmed's review
challenging
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
rhondanation's review
1.0
weirdest enemies to lovers book i’ve ever read. i never want to see the word cream again in my life. this book was definitely meant for someone who’s thirty or something idk
_chloe_reads's review
emotional
funny
hopeful
reflective
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
tylergfoster's review against another edition
5.0
If you, like me, are someone who enjoys Miranda July's work, her novel The First Bad Man is essential. Her film The Future is among my favorite movies of all time, and yet this novel is so good it makes me wish she would dedicate her time to writing more of them. I lost count of the number of times I had to pause because I was laughing so hard at another description of the kind of left-turn neurotic logic that for me captures the conundrum of being alive in a profoundly stupid, beautiful, incoherent world. It is no surprise that she does not want the book to be adapted into a movie (although I would kill to peek into the universe where she allowed Josephine Decker to fulfill her dream of making one), because I cannot imagine a movie capturing a tenth of what makes the book great -- all of that time spent in Cheryl's head.
lightsleeperstudio's review
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0