Saturday night I finished this amazing book by Peter Cameron. It's one of those stories that summaries fail, so I won't even try. This review does pretty well, Brian Farrey's review on Dispatches from an MFA-Seeking Writer, but it seems to me that this story is so well-told that telling what it's about doesn't say much about the book at all.
Furthermore, even though I've given you that link, I'll say that I think it's better to read Someday This Pain Will Be Useful to You without knowing anything that's going to happen. Not that what you read in a review will spoil it, it's just that my preference is always to avoid knowing too much about a book before I read. I want to be open to the most subtle bit of surprise. I want the story to reveal itself. I want to guess and predict. I want to let the writing tell the story.
And this one is the kind of book that you can read the first page and know you want to keep reading.
What I will say here is that the book is hilarious and smart. Protagonist/narrator James slays me with his observations and Cameron just kills me with his dialog. James is a kid (18 years old, in the summer before college) with some serious issues, but despite how impossible he is, I believed that he was either right on or I sympathized completely despite the fact that I knew he was fucking up.
And the way Cameron begins with such a strong, endearing voice and "gotta read this passage aloud to your friend" humor, then gradually reveals the story with precision and restraint . . . What can I say?
I wish I could write like this!
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