Babble Book Club: People Park by Pasha Malla

Huzzah! It's in my local library, got it on hold.  Looks like a great choice - thanks Kaitlin!

I am halfway through this book. It's funny. Great selection, Kaitlin!

I'm currently on page 62. So far it's just a series of short stories connected only in that they happen in the same imaginary city on the same day. It reamins to be seen if the book returns to any of these characters later on.

Finished it before New Year. Mildly entertaining. I presume it was meant to be allegorical or magical realism.

I had to google Richard Brautigan, and I'd also like to hear more about why Dworkin came to mind. I see the PTA and magical realism thoughts -- he says in the Shelagh Rogers interview (I think -- maybe in a review somewhere) that it's not meant to be allegorical, but just interpretive. I'm not sure it works either way, although he also said that Raven is based on Woland in Bulgakov's The Master and Margarita, one of my alltime favourite books. Raven has good points (although I like his understudy Gip much more: "I have only removed the fog of obscurity to reveal the truth. I have only illustrated what you have always known to be true." Said of a picked lock. Heh.) But Raven seems to peter out towards the end.

Interesting question -- by interpretation of the cider motif was that it a) added to the "unique" character of the island world and its ours-but-otherworldliness (no beer here, like), along with the weird people names and idiomatic cursing and b) contributed to the gentrification theme since cider is (kinda, in the NA context) fancier than beer -- dovetailing with the "flat" sandwiches and public transit system.

Kaitlin McNabb wrote:

I am enjoying the read for what it is, and that it is making me "work" at reading.

I have only removed the fog of obscurity to reveal the truth. I have only illustrated what you have always known to be true.

I'm currently on page 161 -- it's getting really interesting. Thanks Kaitlin, for having us read this book.

The part about all the home demolitions to make way for People Park makes me think of the ongoing process of home demolitions in the West Bank to make way for illegal Israeli settlements.

Kaitlin McNabb wrote:

But yes! The "idiomatic cursing", as you so eloquently state, was a flag as well -- Pops and his scene with the men stealing his trailer. How odd.

Pops comment about putting his foot through the guy's head makes me think that if they were to make a movie version, Pops would ideally be played by the actor who played Red Forman on That 70's Show. Ya know, because Red repeatedly threatened to put his foot to Eric's ass.

Actually, I wanted to ask Pasha about the "ambitious" label which showed up in reviews (and is usually applied to books of this genre): was he conscious of the label while writing PP? That is, did he know he was writing an "ambitious" novel? What did that feel like? How does he feel once the book is out there? Is it a compliment or what?

The other question I wanted to ask was also about Pop, Kaitlin. rabble.ca is obviously a left-wing site and many of our readers would have experiences similar to Pop, if not so...er...extreme. Speaking personally as an anti-poverty and anti-gentrification writer and activist, I've met a lot of people who aren't far off from him. And a lot of the scene staging is pretty relevant to the Vancouver context. I've read that PP was originally conceived as set in Montreal, but I wonder what Pasha might say to those who don't take Pop's cause as allegorical or illustrative (to borrow Raven's term), but immedate, specific and urgent?

Hi Pasha. Welcome to babble!

Kaitlin McNabb wrote:

Oh labels and booksellers. To me it seems ambitious because of the multiple stories and characters that overlap and the ability to mentally track them.

Yeah, that's why I used the scare quotes -- it's such a bizarre label, because of course all writers are ambitious! I like your application to Berger's novel -- maybe we should check it out on bbc.  So much better than the usual long=ambitious equation. But I think it also is code, as Kaitlin says, for intersecting characters/plotlines too. I guess my question was also asking if knowing how your publisher would market your book is present in the creative act at all.

Thanks for that explanation, Pasha. I loved Pop's idiomatic language. Such a neat technique that worked just as you say, I think. I interpreted him as being alienated even from language, but the effect is the same as your description. Thanks!

Kaitlin McNabb wrote:

Ambition is needed to read this book for sure, did you ever wonder if it would alienate readers though or was that a concern? We read Murakami earlier on and discussed what seems to be his ability to put the reader aside and just write want he wants and then produce that to the public. Other writers, like Nabokov, seem to do that as well. Did you leave your audience out of this to write the story?

Absolutely not. I mean, I was a little surprised when I had a friend read an early draft and she told me, "People are going to hate this." I really thought I was writing something that might have broad appeal -- not as a goal, I mean, to like write a million copy bestseller, but a book that a reader might feel challenged by in a cool way, that had a certain mystery lacking from a lot of contemporary fiction (at least as i see it). Turns out, I didn't write that book. I'd hate to think I alienated people, but what I've realized since this book came out in July, more than anything, is that the things that fascinate and frighten me, the type of books I love and want to write, are shared by a tiny minority of people, it seems. It's been tough coming to terms with that, to be honest, because I'm a friendly, social guy who generally likes people and can get along with pretty much anyone. But I guess when you try to tap into the most essential stuff about yourself, which is what I tried to do with this book, it can be hugely rewarding to find those things echoed in other people, but also disheartening and lonely-making to see how few people respond in the ways you hoped they might. If that makes sense. I'm typing really fast and probably not thinking hard enough about these answers...

Left Turn wrote:

Question for Pasha. Pasha, whta's the reason you chose not to give the island city a name? Many of the parts of the city have a name, but the city itself is nameless. What's the reasoning behind this?

Who's to say it doesn't have a name?

Yeah, I guess there were just a couple reviews that were fairly insipid, if not iliterate, and I did a TON of press for this book (props to Kate McQuaid at Anansi, one of the best publicists in the biz), and more often than not interviewers either hadn't read the book (this happened three times in one day) or all they wanted to talk about was how many characters there were. Of course, there were some terrific reactions to it too, even some of the more critical ones, which were at least thoughtful. But I'd love someone to call me out on the eschatological structure, on the sort of casual, dilettantish flirtation with chaos theory, etc., or any of the many other aspects of the novel that still feel mysterious to me. This world lived in my head for seven years; now it's in other people's, I want them to help make it a little bigger for me.

Yes, there are a lot of secrets. One per page at least. I've taken at reading and signings and stuff to offer a footnote to anyone who gets their book signed; people pick a page, either at random or specifically, and I make a little note about something they might not have picked up on.

Cider serves a few functions, one of which is that it's one of many puns on the ubiquity of "apple" (i.e. Steve Jobbs) products -- get it? (Wasn't it better when it was unexplained?)

Easter, too, yes, is part of a system of empty religious symbols in the book (the flood, the animals in pairs, various blindings, etc., etc.) That was meant to speak to the need to represent a fully secularized society; this is a book, in many ways, about novels, or the world of fiction, and adopts or parodies or travesties many of the tropes of fiction, the Biblical Symbol being one. But here those symbols are gutted of meaning. Do you want me to explain this more?

I noticed some parallels between stuff in the book and stuff that's happened in Vancouver. The 2010 Olympics comes to mind. That there was a lot of hoopla around it, a lot of tourists came and it was this big deal for the government; but at the same time it was facilitating gentrification particularly in the DTES. Also the destruction of public housing aspect seems analagous to the fight over the fate of the Little Mountain Housing project, among other things.