There are many different ways to look at A Greater Monster. There's the obvious analysis: a book about one man's transcendental journey brought about by the use of a psychoactive drug. The novel is certainly enjoyable at that level. To me, there's a lot more too it than that, though. The book is, in many ways, a Katabasis (a journey to the underworld). Early on in his journey, the protagonist meets Charon (who calls himself Ron), implying a descent into Hades. His descent, though, has more to do with Alice in Wonderland than it does with Greek mythology. There's a whole cast of incredible characters: The Trickster Coyote, the Sphinx, the three seer sisters, The Snow Queen, and even G'nesh (Ganesh). Like Alice, the protagonist undergoes a series of transformations.

There is also a sense that the hero is passing through various worlds, much in the same way a dying man passes through Bardos in the Tibetan Book of the Dead. Each transition and each transformation leads the protagonist into the next level. He eventually ends up at a bizarre circus, which is beautifully illustrated. The book, in a nod to our modern age, also contains 2 URLS that lead to supplementary material for the book (much in the same way that The Raw Shark Texts has unchapters hidden both in the real world and online.)

A Greater Monster is an enjoyable read. It is not "light" reading, however, and the reader needs to pay close attention. The effort is worth it.

Note: The book does contains sexual imagery and is not appropriate for children. ( )

This novel marks a stark departure from the author's earlier Death by Zamboni. A free flowing prose poem, a devilish series of intense artistic moments, condensed into interlocking and dividing particles - It can be described in many different ways, and I will exhaust several of those approaches in my review, but there is no substitute for picking up the book and sampling its heady bouquet.

As daring as Tristram Shandy was in its day perhaps, A Greater Monster pushes the boundaries of fiction by inventing spelling, formatting, and grammatical conventions to suit the ideas and augment the imaginative landscape on display. Remove the textual innovation and you would have a pointillist rendering of a mind, of a state of mind, and in a way, with the atemporal exploration it undertakes, that is enough. Add the rollicking, galloping linguistic deviations back in and you have a new stratum of complexity. The reading experience becomes a multiple choice test where you must, each and every moment, decide whether you like what you see. There will probably be some yeses and nos, as with any book, but there will also be more flip-flopping, see-sawing, and more decisions on your part that you ever expected.

Give the book time to grow on you. Like a Siamese twin, appearing during adolescence or middle age, suddenly, unexpectedly, your new best friend, but somehow disconcerting... Should you embrace it? Question it?

Get comfortable with the unexpected. This novel is an examination of the inner animal in man. The persuasive otherness of inanimate objects. At least, that's one of my many takes on it. Form your mind around its ungraspable shape, if you can.

Shambalic yet controlled. Entropic, almost. Observe the power of words, which take on an amoebic life in the human mind. Some reappear, others fail to show up after having bought a ticket. Words are a currency of exchange, ideas are the products, and within the bazaar between the covers you will be forced to barter for otherworldly beasts and inhuman forms. Imagination is required, check your hat at the door, as you might lose the top of your head, on account of your brain somehow slithering out - but that's just wild speculation on my part. I think my brain is still there. At least I can feel something in the cavity. Thanks to the amorphous quality of the reading experience, I'm seeing flashbacks to the surreal panorama, with every tickling set-piece secreted onto the page, enough alarming precocity to fluster the complacent among us, until the anomalous incantations build into a memorable unease.

In short, the fractal proliferation of ideation, the extension of the text into alternate dimensions, really worked its way in, took up residence, got comfortable, and then started haunting the corridors of my thoughts. Made me want to write something unbounded, limitless, and psychedelic. Hence this review. Probably.

Utterly startling lines I didn't even have to write down. (They were graffitoed on the interior of my skull: "Glazed with the mists of Elysium," and "the sprite striding through dew."
The text assaults the senses in every possible way, I've found. I also remember two very intriguing portmanteaus: "Breathvoid." and "Drummoning." I suspect there were more, thought my eyeballs might have been cowering as they passed by.

The dissociation of environments into psychic backdrops causes reality to melt upon the page. The author's gymnastic prose is like the clashing of cymbals, within which cacophony, with some acclimatization, you can hear subtle tonalities, and finally, complex rhythms. Nightmarish indulgence, vivid hallucinogenic pain and pleasure, thought and form, reflective perceptions - it's all in there. An interesting discussion of mythology I will have to reread, and subtle hints at an underlying mythos. Memory's persistence and deception excuses our perceptive but unhelpful narrator. Memory and whatever he took in the first part of the book, I'm guessing...

Luckily, the book unfolds in a dreamlike diorama. I did not feel rushed. One can sort of luxuriate in the boiling tarpit of brain waves. It is, at bottom, a well-paced adventure and a Lovecraftian quest, mixing the tangible and the intangible, the weird and the uncanny. I recall what was one of my favorite two-word combinations of all time occurring. That is: "GORMLESS SLEEP."

That one took me back. It's even better in context. I feel the need to use it somewhere now. Like on a bathroom stall.

By turns bizarre, grotesque, absurd, emotional, exotic, but always interesting and cutting edge, the
permutations of visions, the ersatz realities layering one another, the reincarnation of form and motif, palimpsest, and the vanishings that linger mysteriously, all lead up to an impressive whole.

The cameo of "Kaliban" was appreciated. The improvisational, aggressive prose provides the requisite variety. The parade of chimerical creatures, the symbolic manifestations, and the march of madness through a kaleidoscopic consciousness, all afford a sense of deep scrutiny of the human as a metaphysical entity. Spells and metamorphoses, candid, lurid storms of images, a playful, haphazard, glorious circus of monstrosities - and there's more... A playground for the id, a shifting canvas, an anamorphic eye, a twisted helix of form and ever-immersive delusion, torrents of humor, melancholy and misapprehension, isolationism, profound escapism... I could go on... Helicoptering doom, the manic, systematic unraveling of feverish, polyping concepts. After reading it, you might start to sound like this too...

But again, you have to actually read the book. The reviews can't do it justice - as amusing as most of them are.

The Greater Monster is a place where solitary ideas live out staged existences, under a hypnogogic spotlight, under the etheric illumination of a brilliant artist. While reading this book I couldn't stop thinking about the scene from Eraserhead famously referred to as "Dance of the Radiator Girl." Within the film it stands out as a puzzling mystery, but upon reflection it will likely haunt you to your dying day.
( )

”I was having a hard time wrapping my head around...why I was doing what I was doing. And what exactly was I doing? Outlines softened. Surfaces went foggy. What was I supposed to be doing? I was caged in solid smoke, sharp smoke. I saw it settling in, filling the space. A skintight dream with hard corners, corroded metal defined space. I shaped the proportions when I could to avoid the spikes. The hard-beat of work. Pain and pleasure cannot be argued with. They demonstrate me. Touching is just electrons repelling. Nothing can touch. Ever. I passed my arm before my eyes and watched it skip past me like slowed frames in an old movie. Life was stop-motion. Realization: We render times by stitching together moments - flipping pages in the book of consciousness presents a continuous stream. Our senses too slow to realize the separation of moments, like a strand of pearls through eternity. Time is terrifying, time is unspeakable. Clock-time lies down between moments...but distance warps with velocity, time bends with velocity. Frames of Reference. Are not absolute. Are selfish. A private reality. Clocks have a life of their own. Framed by references.”

In “A Greater Monster” by David David Katzman

I was first introduced to Bizarro at The British Council when my English instructor, Vicky Hartnack, had us read a story by Carlton Mellick III. A lot of people in the class thought it was stupid, childish, and "weird for the sake of weird." Then the instructor broke it down and explained to us why it was actually an intelligent piece of writing. Those in the class that didn't get it are a lot like the people who dismiss Bizarro: they aren't as smart as they think they are.

Do Bizarro writers get six figure advances? Nah. If someone says they do, they’re wonderfully over-the-top. Most publishers would look at SF, satire and the generally weird as they would a two week old tuna sandwich. The money is in the masses--books one hears about on NPR and Oprah. Bizarro writers have to pay at vanity presses to get their stuff published and, well, yeah: they end up with a storage unit full of books. But with the internet and younger generations, there's probably a steadily growing market/scene for the genre. Nerdtastic books about aliens, robots and sex are not so far off from anime, manga, snarky blogs and the strange worlds of video games. And...seriously: the folks commenting about the lack of literary quality in the genre need to realize that whether or not they like a book is a subjective thing; a genre as it stands alone is a genre only. It's entirely pretentious to presume that one genre above others lays universal claim to the best wordsmithing. Sheesh. Some people watch golf and some people watch half-naked android chicks shooting up crablike security bots in a dystopian future Tokyo. That's just how it is. I won't take a prudish "it's bloody weird that Bizarro nonsense and I like me books linear and with a happy ending..." approach. I'm not really interested in what they do in their spare time though. They could snort ketamine off a dead hooker's back every night while playing SNES games with imaginary friends and it wouldn't make me appreciate what they've written anymore than what I do now. It's either good or it's whack regardless of how much of a frat pack they are. But Katzman’s novel has got me thinking over the weekend. While I hold dear that Bizarro, as a genre, is not for me, I got punched in the face by it; I must have a look to see if there are any *what I would consider* meaningful writers like Katzman amongst the skidmarks. Bizarro writers aren't trying to be Ed Wood. According to some statements made online, Bizarro wants to create the literary equivalent of the Cult section at video stories. The Cult section of a video store isn't simply filled with Ed Wood titles and other bad B-movies. It is varied, though a key distinguishing factor is "weirdness." Can be madcap weirdness. Surreal weirdness. Satirical weirdness. A mix of many weirdnesses. Book stores tend not to have such a section, so people who want truly weird fiction must search a bit more, unfortunately. And it's hard to judge a genre by simply hearing about it, or reading just a few titles. There are many Bizarro authors, and they have very different styles and approaches, not all of which are juvenile. Read “A Greater Monster.” I can guarantee you’ll re-read it like I did. What’s it about? Not sure. It's like jazz, free-forms, free-floating, riffs and fugues, a dive into unsettling textures and ideas. 'Experimental' it is, but not necessarily so far out that you won't find something of yourself in it. I’ll have to re-read it once again to find whether the Monster is within me.

David David Katzman has more imagination in one finger than the Bolex brothers could ever dream of. One of the main reasons SF is subjected to such universal disparagement is the preconceived notion that it is all badly written prose written by infantile minds obsessed with shiny things. So give them good prose (vide quote above). And no shiny things. Mr. David David Katzman please step up to the plate. Nary a spaceship/zap gun/shiny thing in sight (there might be the odd talking toaster). And such remarkable, fluid, humane prose. Although you've got to like your cup of tea dark if Katzman is going to be your cup of tea (and apologies for the pun).

NB: SF = Speculative Fiction. ( )

I'm not done with the book yet, but I can't resist beginning a review for this is a work of genius, linguistic genius, written by someone who can obviously do whatever he wants with words. A Greater Monster is listed as or tagged as a work of apocalyptic literature and a work of fantasy--apocalyptic maybe, but fantasy? No--it's surrealism intensely realized. I'll be back when I finish the book.

Done.

I came across this in a book today: 'Added to this is the knowledge we unconsciously take to the streets: to Heraclitus has been attributed the observation that one cannot step into the same river twice; to atomic physicists this has been exacerbated by the proofs that no material is the same twice. Worse, insights beginning in the 19th century developed into a cataract—never the same twice—of understanding of our inner worlds, which not only are in incessant flux, but cannot but distort the external environment with which they interplay.' Katzman's A Greater Monster takes this assumption as a starting point for his philosophical discussion about existence, which is what I take the antics in the book to be all about. Among the descriptions of an original bestiary there are astute comments, profound discussions, a very critical examination/plaint regarding the human.
I have to compare Katzman to someone, which is what you do when you write a review that wants to express that the author is good enough to enter the canon. But I doubt Katzman would agree that Samuel Beckett is his primary literary cohort. And I couldn't really explain why that idea came to me, and, a la the voices in A Greater Monster, nor can I be sure I still think that or if it is planted in my skull estranged or if I actually do remember having thought that, or if I am about to think it, getting ahead of myself. Anyway, his prose isn't like Beckett's. Nor Joyce's. He has done what I think was meant to be done with Joyce--he has accommodated him, learned a bit from him, rather than ignoring him. The book is not Joycean--it's Katzmanian.
When I paused in reading to begin this review I assumed there was some chance the book was going nowhere, so to speak, that it really had no plot and would not require one. I didn't care, and I don't care that I don't yet understand the meaning relayed by the forty or so pages of drawings--but I am rather amazed at the way the story told in the book crept up on me as I so regally regarded myself in ecstasy over the language. At some point rather late in the book I was hoping to finish as soon as possible so I could get to this review, but I had several other reading deadlines and had to content myself with fits of reading, and before I could be done with the novel the story insinuated itself into my reading and quite surprisingly it became emotionally moving--and this anti-novel novelized into a profound ending.
Here are some things I underlined, to provide some idea of Katzman's ingenuity:
The sky is dull and blank like suburban dreams.
Is that all you got, nubcake?
a hypnogogic pillow
color of friction in my mouth [synaesthesia is common tool in this book]
I'm skinless inside my plastic hassle.
Back into the grim haze that's grey and grinning like a mad dog.
space is too nake when hidden
The ceiling cops a rustic attitude
it's the sound of time splitting off from space
Coarse, stratal chimes like the ringing of dirt-brown earth.
the unitary ontolojest the everlasting laugh
Nerves of spoor with hysteria.
Life is tough on a chick with alligator lips.
Homo saperior!
Baskets filled with glowing lichens cast an eerie glow.
Absence hurts the roof of my mouth like loneliness.
noisome methane rollicks in fetid sinkholes
Now, if that's not horny, I'll burn my ass hair.
My dear lazies and genitalmen.
Dear labias and gentrified.
The unquenchisite fuck after erasure. But I'm attracted to the raw.
Feel right in your poin garden?
What I wonder is, is lust complete shrivelscorch?
My scaly loden shell.
recollection is a cannibal
The amethyst parrot disappears into the helium sky.
Move along, rabid thing.
Probably that list would be review enough, and it's true that having made it I am left with little to say. This is one of the most profound books I've ever read, and I am absolutely certain I don't understand it well yet. I will read it again, and probably understand a bit more. But that doesn't matter, for this is a phenomenon, and phenomena have their own existences...if they do... ( )

1/3/12 Was listed as the number one book of "10 Hot Chicago Reads For Chilly Nights" on Refinery29.com: http://www.refinery29.com/new-books

12/31/12 Was named a top 10 book of 2012 on The Common Ills blog. According to the post:

"... Beth championed it near weekly in her column for the gina and krista round-robin. It is a jigsaw of writing and you find yourself falling down the rabbit hole. 'A book to ponder and to read for the sheer life on the page,' Beth observed.

12/7/12 A flattering review appeared in The Chicagoist for A Greater Monster. Some highlights:

"This is a psychedelic-Burroughs-dream and an aggravated-Lewis-Carroll-nightmare, a world in which we must continuously re-adjust our bearings....The brilliance of his imagination aside, we must also consider that this novel is a lot to absorb....Yes, the novel is difficult to read at times. Yes, you will have to read certain passages more than once and often read them in various ways. Of course, your face will start to hurt from the perplexed look you'll be wearing over the duration of the book. However, you will be refreshed with new characters and situations every few pages--all of which will be other-worldly. You will stumble onto sparks, which will snowball into a catharsis more than once. Most of all, you will be challenged as both a reader and a thinker. If the pros outweigh the cons for you, then David David Katzman might just be your new favorite author."

5/27/12 Received a thoughtful review in the Psychedelic Press UK here: http://fb.me/1L1NL4ebJ The reviewer says:

"The book’s blurb describes it as 'Innovative and astonishing… [breathing] new life into the possibilities of fiction' and, without doubt, the novel lives up to this description: A psychedelic journey into the splintered mind of a life on the desiring edge."

5/1/12 A Greater Monster has won a Gold Medal as an "Outstanding Book of the Year" in the 2012 Independent Publisher Book Awards. So say the awards: "These medalists were chosen from our regular entries for having the courage and creativity necessary to take chances, break new ground, and bring about change, not only to the world of publishing, but to our society." There were only 10 winners in different categories out of 5000 entries. The judges of the competition sent me the following review quotes from their evaluation:

"Imaginative, explosive and poetic. A real trip!"
"A brain-singeing look at humanity at its strangest."
"Dark and edgy, like a Blade Runner for English majors."

1/27/12 - Another lovely review, this one from from Reader Views critic Paige Lovitt. Full review is here. Last paragraph reads:

Intelligently written and displayed, A Greater Monster is truly like no book I have ever read before. While visions of Alice in Wonderland strayed through the back of my thoughts, this book is so much more. I admire David David Katzman’s creativity and the amount of work that must have gone into creating such an exotic literary gift for readers who like to read beyond the lines of contemporary fiction.

Received a review from Midwest Book Review. Here are the highlights:

[When] we see something unusual, we rarely expect it to be the tip of the iceberg. A Greater Monster is a novel from David David Katzman who brings readers into a unique alternate reality that has many twists and turns ... With unique humor and plenty to think about, A Greater Monster is a fine and much recommended choice.

Several writers were kind enough to read my book in manuscript form before its release. They had the following to say:

“Brilliant, insane and utterly unique, A Greater Monster offers pure sensory stimulation, verging on sensory overload. The graphics, concept and narration are pause-worthy, and they all combine to create literary indulgence at its best—its most interactive. The narrator in A Greater Monster doesn’t hold your hand and guide you; he doesn’t ask you to like him. Instead, he delivers a sharp uppercut to your chin and asks you to stop cowering, open your eyes, and fight back. You will. He’ll make you.”—Jen Knox, author of [b:To Begin Again|10783352|To Begin Again|Jen Knox|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1349070595s/10783352.jpg|15307704] (2011 Next Generation Indie Book Award winner)

“Beautiful mystic-schizo DayGlo wordage. Poetic prose that befuddles, enchants, and amuses the reader at the same time.”—Lance Carbuncle, author of[b:Grundish Askew|6774979|Grundish and Askew|Lance Carbuncle|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1347219135s/6774979.jpg|6975258]

“This is bizarro fiction at its most intense. It contains scenes and unique designs that seem engineered by some Mad Hatter and Chuck Palahniuk cross-breed.”—Lavinia Ludlow, author of [b:alt.punk|9685054|alt.punk|Lavinia Ludlow|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1347511566s/9685054.jpg|14573079]

“After David David Katzman’s brilliant first novel, Death by Zamboni, a masterclass in the uses to which comic writing can be put, comes a novel that couldn’t be more different. A Greater Monster opens in a world that’s immediately and recognizably ours … before spinning off into a spiritual (and carnal) quest that reads like Alice on acid, while channeling every trash sci-fi nightmare Creepy Tales had to offer.”—Charles Lambert, author of [b:Scent of Cinnamon|3870172|The Scent Of Cinnamon (Salt Modern Fiction)|Charles Lambert|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1348274618s/3870172.jpg|3915362] and [b:Any Human Face|6789444|Any Human Face|Charles Lambert|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1267780852s/6789444.jpg|6993053]

“A Greater Monster is a highly creative and original story combining poetry, imagery, and prose—all working seamlessly without a break in momentum.”—Charlie Courtland, author of [b:Dandelions in the Garden|7308222|Dandelions in the Garden (Countess Elizabeth Bathory, #1)|Charlie Courtland|http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1298515466s/7308222.jpg|8765846]

“I can’t express how brilliant my favorite scenes in A Greater Monster are. In this extraordinary work, Katzman pushes language to do things, which are truly astounding. This is where Artaud meets Williams S. Burroughs meets Lewis Carroll in an obscene, violent dissolution of character, plot, and setting. A Greater Monster dismantles the foundations of narrative, of the human subject as master and center of time and space, reason and language, and the word is transformed into image, into an indigestible thing that both resists easy consumption and is utterly entertaining.”—Carra Stratton, Editor Starcherone Press ( )