Gary Shteyngart’s Super Sad True Love Story

Ok, I’ll say it.  I think he’s jumped the shark.  I adored his first two books and I count him as one of the greatest influences in my writing style and ideas, simply because his were the first books I read that specifically described the Russian Jew immigrant experience in North America with wry humor rather than introspective self-righteous self-pity a la “The Namesake,” and because they were just so damn relatable to me.  He gave me hope that even descriptions of a niche group would be popular among mainstream American literature.

But, as his popularity continues to grow, I think that, unlike his character in the book trailer who can’t read and therefore cannot mop up influences, he has gotten a bit cocky and even unsure and has started to rehash themes in an unoriginal way, creating meme upon meta-meme within his works.  This was evident even in his last book, Absurdistan, which I still loved to pieces.

All of this shit having been talked, I’ll read it, and who knows, maybe the book will be amazing again.   Because, anyone who can get James Franco to guest-star in their book trailer has something good up their sleeve.

Check out his latest in the New Yorker.