Life is Nowhere. The Novel Permanent Obscurity by Richard Perez Reviewed by Kenneth Halpern

Perpetual OBSCURITY: Or A Cautionary Tale to Two Girls and Their Misadventures with Drugs, Pornography and Death by Dolores Santana (as advised to Richard Perez)

 

As the long, cynical title of this novel infers, this is a dull, numskull parody/parody, both decrepit and dismal, including two youthful, obscene ladies with aesthetic dreams, and an insane, practically illusory trick saturated with the creation of a BDSM "femdom" film to take care of some low-level criminals/street pharmacists.

 

It's a foul and shocking bit of work, in any event, nauseating in parts, sure to totally estrange the Oprah Book swarm with its blatant dismissal for standard American qualities; and the two heroes, Dolores and Serena, cheerfully wild, both regarding conduct and substance misuse.

 

While never paying attention to itself, this novel by Richard Perez really covers a ton of genuine ground (particularly in the initial segment of the book), including genuine issues confronting a ton of youthful Americans, especially those battling in expressions of the human experience: continuing work (as in getting a harmony between lines of work and an opportunity to make craftsmanship), medical care (or the absence of health care coverage) as one of the heroes gets pregnant; and repaying amazing obligation (as in understudy advances, which raises doubt about how complicit Universities are in adding to the American thought of living in the red).

The story style of PERMANENT OBSCURITY is free and unconstrained, somewhere close to Irvine Welsh and Charles Bukowski. The crudeness of the composing is regularly jolting and Bukowski-like and uneducated such that underscores the universe of the Lower East Side (and the East Village) and the conditions of the heroes.