sethisan

Hi Joey, whom would you consider to be your biggest literary influences? Do you have a favorite book or author?

A friend of mine wrote the following in a review of your work:

"It’s the type of book that entertains without being lowbrow; it provokes thought in an era when attention spans are diminishing faster than forests; it says a lot without saying much; in its pages profundity and shallowness coexist peacefully; it is “pop” and yet it is intellectual; it is intellectual and yet it is “pop”; it is both serious and facile; its satirical value is recognizable yet dubious; it ain’t no treatise on zeitgeist but to ignore it isn’t sound either; it will start good barroom conversation but won’t stoke public debate; its limits are matched in rigour only by its ambitions; it couldn’t fetch a six figure advance but ensured the writer’s kitchen fires burnt hotly; it was reviewed by NYT but LRB didn’t deign to cover it; it has many ideas, but lacks coherence; it is catchy but it is not – to use Klosterman’s frequently occurring phrase – “of import”; it will be read by many, but will never carry the “Penguin’s Modern Classics” logo; it has an “Acknowledgements” section but is far too unimportant and unscholarly to contain footnotes. "

What do you feel about this appraisal?