[+!] Kane X. Faucher, Matina Stamatakis, John Moore Williams, Distributed by Calliope Nerve. Reviewed by Lynn Alexander.
In the interest of unnecessary disclosure- but perhaps by way of confessional preface- I had to read this more than once. Even when I took up the pen to get going with my thoughts, I found myself stalling, crossing things out. When they said experimental, they weren’t kidding. WHY was it so hard to articulate my impressions of this book? It’s not that I didn’t enjoy the experience, I did-even more so in subsequent returns to it. You might say it grew on me, the way odd things do.
The challenge though in “reviewing” comes from the very nature of the work, the experimental nature, and the fact that very often what is described as experimental is actually quite predictable. Ah- but not so here. The collaborators, I think, want you to step away from your comfort zone and abandon a few dozen notions when you sit with this.
So- how DOES one attempt to write about a work in some kind of objective way (no such thing) when much of the experience wouldn’t even be considered “conscious”? You want to engage, actively and intellectually, but there is something about the strangeness of [+!] that pushes that away. Continue reading →
