Brief Interviews With Hideous Men, by David Foster Wallace: **7/8

I enjoyed this book, but it definitely didn't pack the punch of the other books I've read by Wallace. While there were moments of brilliance, there was also more filler than in any of his other writings. I read a review somewhere on the book that talked about how even when Wallace misfires, he's still interesting. I think that's a great summary of this book. It's still interesting, and there are great things in it, but there are lots of misfires. To some extent, I almost feel like Wallace is aware of this, but is trying to do something different anyway just to see what our reaction will be.

Fortunately, the best parts of the book are the repeated title essays - brief interviews with hideous men - which appear several times throughout the book. I haven't counted, but I'd guess that somewhere close to half the book is comprised of these essays, which are really more like character studies of bizarre people, and these essays are good. Very good, very funny, very enjoyable. The rest of the book is hit-or-miss. Some of the stories, notably one about a young kid on his birthday, are moving and show the kind of work Wallace can be capable of when he's really got it going on. Others, such as "Octet", can become quite dreary as Wallace takes potential situations and just keeps spinning them out, talking endlessly about stagnation and too many possibilities. I would compare reading some of these stories to speaking with somebody who is trying to explain the details of a job that just isn't interesting, and then that person continues to talk and talk and talk. At least 3-4 stories should have ended much much much earlier. But it's still pretty good stuff overall, despite the problems, and it's interesting to see how Wallace thinks. He has an amazing ability to come up with interesting characters, and this book displays a number of new and fascinating (and often somewhat disturbing) people. But it seems that his work is best served by placing these interesting people into a single story and watching their interaction instead of simply listing them one after another in character studies. So I would much more strongly recommend all of his other books.
(summer 2003)

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