Douglas Coupland - Classic or Dud?

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I am reading Microserfs and not liking it much.

Should I read Generation X?

explain me Coupland.

― Grandpont Genie, Friday, 9 March 2007 14:26 (eighteen years ago)

Read Generation X for sure. If you still don't like it don't worry, at least you'll have given him a chance. I used to be a huge fan and gradually got really sick of his schtick. He is not as funny or as clever as he thinks he is. He can't seem to actually write a book without countless deus ex machinae and tricks (e.g. different fonts) to make it look like something is happening that is exciting but it really isn't!! I had the misfortune of going to see "Everything's Gone Green." It was him at his worst. So Dud for me sadly enough.

― kv_nol, Friday, 9 March 2007 14:53 (eighteen years ago)

hey nostradamus! is a really good book, cos he plays it straight for once & cans the annoying smartarse dialogue. the rest of his books are pretty dud though - microserfs & the truely appalling jpod are the worst ones.

― zappi, Friday, 9 March 2007 14:57 (eighteen years ago)

there is a chapter of Microserfs that is all binary. It was like 1001010100111011010110100111011011101101110110111011011101101110110111011011101101110110111011011101101110110111011 all the way through.

problem with Microserfs is:

it has dated badly
I have yet to find any of the references that anyone reading couldn't make up for themselves. I'm reading it and I'm like "well, I can take the piss out of geeks, I've met a few!" I'm relying on you as an author who supposedly has some interesting things to say about technology, modern culture and the human condition to tell me something I don't know, not simply regurgitate things I do.

― Grandpont Genie, Friday, 9 March 2007 14:58 (eighteen years ago)

I really liked Microserfs a lot when I first read it, but it has aged rather badly.
JPod is quite possibly one of the worst books I've ever read - if that was his attempt at bringing a Microserfs world up to date then he shouldn't have got out of bed for the afternoon that it took him to write it. Really apalling.

― treefell, Friday, 9 March 2007 15:10 (eighteen years ago)

I liked Microserfs, and I still do, really. JPod definitely isn't great - it's too over-the-top and silly.

It took me years to realise that Generation X, written in the early 90s, is set in 2000.

― Forest Pines, Friday, 9 March 2007 15:28 (eighteen years ago)

I agree with everything Kv said there. I used to love Coupland, especially Shampoo Planet, but All Families are Psychotic and its shitty ending was the one that did me in.

However, Hey Nostradamus is great.

― accentmonkey, Friday, 9 March 2007 15:30 (eighteen years ago)

I've never read any of his books. He's speaking this weekend at sxsw. should I go see him?

genie, you're on a thread roll today.

― Ms Misery, Friday, 9 March 2007 15:30 (eighteen years ago)

I bought City of Glass while visitingVancouver this summer and thought it was a lot of fun (though I haven't looked at it since), but I've never read (nor been particularly interested in) his fiction.

― C0L1N B..., Friday, 9 March 2007 15:32 (eighteen years ago)

I've never read any of his books. He's speaking this weekend at sxsw. should I go see him?

No.

― kv_nol, Friday, 9 March 2007 15:38 (eighteen years ago)

cool. thought it would probably be boring.

― Ms Misery, Friday, 9 March 2007 15:39 (eighteen years ago)

What is Microserfs about anyways? I was actually thinking this moring it's a cool sounding name but don't want to start reading it just because of that!

― The Cursed Return of the Dastardly Thermo Thinwall, Friday, 9 March 2007 15:44 (eighteen years ago)

"generation x" and "girlfriend in a coma" are among my favourite books. but just about everything since "microserfs" (with the exception of the good-in-bits "Miss Wyoming") is TERRIBLE. seriously his last x books have been god-awful. "hey nostradamus" VERY MUCH included. guh. the best example of a writer i once loved and now utterly ignore. he's clearly spending more time on his visual art than on his writing. lazy as shit.

― sean gramophone, Friday, 9 March 2007 15:48 (eighteen years ago)

I saw Douglas Coupland a couple of times about 18 months ago, once at a book signing and then at an evening event at The Other Place in Stratford. I've never read any of his stuff but my son is/was a big fan so we went together. He was quite amusing in a sort of "clever - clever" way, so if it's free it wouldn't be a bad bit of entertainment.

― AbdyJack, Friday, 9 March 2007 15:48 (eighteen years ago)

I got badly ripped off on a signed boxed j-pod. He had signed a label that was put in the book afterwards. Very insulting!

― kv_nol, Friday, 9 March 2007 15:52 (eighteen years ago)

it's free b/c my work is paying for me to go to the conference. I might pop in depending on what else is happening that hour. I have a feeling I'll be sleeping through most of the next few days anyway. . .

― Ms Misery, Friday, 9 March 2007 15:52 (eighteen years ago)

My favorite book by him is "Shampoo Planet"-- granted the context under which I read it was pretty funny:

16 years old, visiting grandparents in Arizona, laying by the pool, reading shampoo planet, listening to "The Velvet Underground and Nico"

Can we say Jaded, anyone?

But I loved that book and Gen Ex, Girlfriend in a coma, and Ms. Wyoming. You have to take it with a grain of salt, an acceptence of the disillusionment, that it sometimes gets a bit cheesy.

― Caledonia, Friday, 9 March 2007 18:35 (eighteen years ago)

Coupland thread on ILE:
http://www.ilxor.com:8080/ILX/ThreadSelectedControllerServlet?boardid=40&threadid=3705

Coupland thread on ILB:
http://www.ilxor.com:8080/ILX/ThreadSelectedControllerServlet?boardid=55&threadid=272

― nabisco, Friday, 9 March 2007 18:39 (eighteen years ago)

I strongly, strongly dislike this man and his writings. -fin-

― Abbott, Friday, 9 March 2007 19:59 (eighteen years ago)

I absolutely love "Souvenirs of Canada". The last page has nearly made cry on more than one occasion. I also remember liking "Life After God", but it must be close to 10 years since I last read it. On a personal level, he seems like he'd be alright in person.

― j-rock, Monday, 12 March 2007 04:09 (eighteen years ago)

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