{"id":1348,"date":"2018-12-31T16:49:01","date_gmt":"2018-12-31T16:49:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/?p=1348"},"modified":"2018-12-31T16:49:01","modified_gmt":"2018-12-31T16:49:01","slug":"reynolds-wire-mother-monkey-baby_061018","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/?p=1348","title":{"rendered":"Reynolds, Wire Mother Monkey Baby_061018"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>\n
\n

LITERARY FICTION<\/p>\n

Rob Reynolds<\/span><\/p>\n

Wire Mother Monkey Baby: A Novel<\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

Outpost 19<\/p>\n

Paperback, 978-1-9448-5337-2, 262 pages, $16.00<\/p>\n

November 7, 2017<\/p>\n

Clayton Draper, attempting to jump-start his stagnating life, <\/span>moves into a new development in Austin called The Complex, one of a new trend in \u201call-inclusive\u201d apartment communities boasting sports facilities, restaurants, bars, and cinemas, among other distractions\u2014ahem, I meant attractions\u2014subsidized by corporations. Draper\u2019s new home, sponsored by Kool Kola, is a \u201cmicrocosm of the outside world,\u201d he writes, \u201conly more micro, less cosmic.\u201d Draper\u2019s new home of exposed brick and cathedral ceilings includes a Kool Kola vending machine, which is inventoried monthly by a judgmental service technician. Draper, the ingrate, isn\u2019t drinking enough Kool Kola. Absurdist humor and clinical depression infuse Reynolds\u2019 debut in equal measure.<\/p>\n

Draper, imagining a \u201cnew self \u2026 better and more cultured,\u201d tries to escape his comfort zone to take advantage of the social opportunities at The Complex. He attends French films, where he obsesses over whether he\u2019s chosen the best seat; talks up women in bars, where \u201cInstead of getting the night started on the right foot,\u201d he laments, \u201c[he] learned once again how [his] mouth is perfectly sized to receive it\u201d; and wanders barbecues where, \u201cWith one of two hands occupied [with a beer bottle he] had fifty-fifty odds of coming across as normal.\u201d<\/p>\n

We know Draper\u2019s in trouble when he begins referring to Austin as \u201cWaterloo.\u201d He tries various strategies for happiness: Retail therapy at San Marcos outlet malls, adding \u201csomething tangible, verifiable, to [his] life\u201d; quits his job for freelance (\u201cRefusing to bow to the god called Security\u201d); and the geography cure, a trip to Paris, but Draper stays firmly in character, and wherever you go, there you are.<\/p>\n

Wire Mother Monkey Baby: A Novel<\/span> is the first book from Austin\u2019s Rob Reynolds, <\/span>former associate and contributing editor of the Harvard Review<\/span> and Boston Book Review.<\/span> Reynolds\u2019s short fiction appears in the Tampa Review<\/span> and the Kennesaw Review,<\/span> among other publications, and was anthologized in You Have Time for This: Contemporary American Short-Short Stories.<\/span> His first novel is a commentary on happiness in the twenty-first-century United States where appearance trumps substance, we\u2019ve lost the distinction between alone and lonely, and we make ourselves ill contorting to fit the mold.<\/p>\n

First, that title: Wire Mother Monkey Baby<\/span> alludes to psychologist Harry Harlow\u2019s experiments with infant rhesus monkeys involving maternal-separation, dependency needs, and social isolation. The monkeys were separated from their mothers within hours of birth and presented with surrogates either made of wire and holding a bottle of food or covered in terrycloth but lacking food. The baby monkeys with the terrycloth mothers, food or no, benefitted from contact comfort, a psychological resource unavailable to the well-fed but psychically damaged babies of wire mothers. Draper has material riches\u2014the wire mothers of materialism\u2014but he\u2019s an emotional train wreck.<\/p>\n

Wire Mother Monkey Baby<\/span> chronicles a year of Draper\u2019s midlife existential crisis in the form of journal entries. Consulting God, Mary Poppins, de Tocqueville, Tilda Swinton, Studs Terkel, Dwight Yoakam, The Flintstones, and bourbon (a partial list), Draper chases happiness. \u201cThere\u2019s a tall order,\u201d he writes, \u201c[it\u2019s] in the Declaration of Independence \u2026 our patriotic duty to pursue happiness. Such pressure.\u201d<\/p>\n

I was initially intrigued by Reynolds\u2019 sardonic style and clever word play. However, Wire Mother Monkey Baby <\/span>is light on dialogue and storyline, heavy on exposition and interior monologue. The quick pace soon trips on little external conflict or plot. Reynolds\u2019 sharp social commentary is spot-on, if confined to first-world problems; I\u2019m reminded of Huxley\u2019s A Brave New World<\/span> and Eggers\u2019 The Circle.<\/span> Reynolds has created a nuanced character with merit, even though his neurotic, semi-alcoholic navel-gazing becomes tiresome.<\/p>\n

Wire Mother Monkey Baby<\/span> is frequently entertaining and engaging, but pervasively uneven. Reynolds is talented and promising. I look forward to his next effort.<\/p>\n

* * * * *<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

LITERARY FICTION Rob Reynolds Wire Mother Monkey Baby: A Novel Outpost 19 Paperback, 978-1-9448-5337-2, 262 pages, $16.00 November 7, 2017 Clayton Draper, attempting to jump-start his stagnating life, moves into a new development in Austin called The Complex, one of a new trend in \u201call-inclusive\u201d apartment communities boasting sports facilities, restaurants, bars, and cinemas, among […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1348","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1348","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1348"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1348\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1348"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1348"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress.etypegoogle10.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1348"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}