Jesus’ Son – Denis Johnson
Read: Dec. 13th 2023
Published: 1992
Country: USA
Length: 144 pages
Kinda meh I thought. Some good writing in there but I found it to be pretty unmemorable and just wasn’t really into it.
Brief Summary:
Denis Johnson’s now classic story collection Jesus’ Son chronicles a wild netherworld of addicts and lost souls, a violent and disordered landscape that encompasses every extreme of American culture. These are stories of transcendence and spiraling grief, of hallucinations and glories, of getting lost and found and lost again. The insights and careening energy in Jesus’ Son have earned the book a place of its own among the classics of twentieth-century American literature.
Quotes:
- “Under Midwestern clouds like great grey brains we left the superhighway with a drifting sensation and entered Kansas City’s rush hour with a sensation of running aground.”
- “the seeds were moaning in the gardens.”
- “There were many moments in the Vine like that one—where you might think today was yesterday, and yesterday was tomorrow, and so on. Because we all believed we were tragic, and we drank.”
- “people wandering the streets with their heads shot off by money.”
- “Well, I’m older than you are. You can take a couple more rides on this wheel and still get out with all your arms and legs stuck on right. Not me.” “Hey. You’re doing fine.” “Talk into here.” “Talk into your bullet hole?” “Talk into my bullet hole. Tell me I’m fine.”
- “I gave four dollars, almost all my money, to one of the college girls and her boyfriend, who didn’t speak English. They were going to get us all some Taiwanese pot. I stood at the window looking at the apartment building’s parking lot while the brother brushed his teeth, and watched them leave with my money in a green sedan. They ran into a phone pole before they were even out of the parking lot. They got out of the sedan and staggered away, leaving the car doors open, clinging to each other, their hair flying around their faces in the wind.”