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A review by natsirt_esq
Zero K by Don DeLillo
2.0
This is a weird book. Bizarre characters, awkward dialogue, a barely present plot, and an overall pretentiousness make this a book you should skip.
The book is about a son and his father going to a facility somewhere in asia where they freeze bodies. In the future hopefully the bodies can be reanimated. The father's girlfriend is ill and chooses to be frozen. While at the facility our protagonist, Jeff, encounters a monk who engages him in awkward dialogue that goes nowhere. He also sees the creators of the facility give a rambling nonsense speech about the future. While walking the halls screens will occasionally drop down and play videos of random things. Sometimes monks burning themselves, sometimes people running, all of it nonsense. Dad's girlfriend gets frozen and they leave the facility.
For a brief period of time Jeff interacts with his girlfriend and her adopted son. It seemingly has nothing to do with the rest of book. Shortly after this his girlfriend's adopted son runs away. It's now been about two years since dad's girlfriend got frozen and dad decides he wants to get frozen as well. Back to the facility they go. While there, the video screen shows Jeff his girlfriend's adopted son getting killed in a battle. We learn about the new language they've developed. The founder of the facility gives another rambling speech that goes nowhere and serves no purpose. Dad gets frozen, the book ends.
Example terrible dialogue from page 113.
"Your father yes. And you're my son."
"No, no. I'm not ready for that. You're getting ahead of me. I'm doing my best to recognize the fact that you're my father. I'm not ready to be your son."
Not dialogue, but this line from page 231 gives you a good idea of what this entire book is like.
"One man, headless -- he had no head."
Reading this book was a chore. I'm not entirely sure why I finished it. If I had it to do over again I'd give up after about 50 pages. I thought it was just weird and would get better. It stayed weird and got worse. The ending does nothing to redeem it. It sounds like DeLillo has better books, but it will be a long time before I'm willing to give them a shot.
The book is about a son and his father going to a facility somewhere in asia where they freeze bodies. In the future hopefully the bodies can be reanimated. The father's girlfriend is ill and chooses to be frozen. While at the facility our protagonist, Jeff, encounters a monk who engages him in awkward dialogue that goes nowhere. He also sees the creators of the facility give a rambling nonsense speech about the future. While walking the halls screens will occasionally drop down and play videos of random things. Sometimes monks burning themselves, sometimes people running, all of it nonsense. Dad's girlfriend gets frozen and they leave the facility.
For a brief period of time Jeff interacts with his girlfriend and her adopted son. It seemingly has nothing to do with the rest of book. Shortly after this his girlfriend's adopted son runs away. It's now been about two years since dad's girlfriend got frozen and dad decides he wants to get frozen as well. Back to the facility they go. While there, the video screen shows Jeff his girlfriend's adopted son getting killed in a battle. We learn about the new language they've developed. The founder of the facility gives another rambling speech that goes nowhere and serves no purpose. Dad gets frozen, the book ends.
Example terrible dialogue from page 113.
"Your father yes. And you're my son."
"No, no. I'm not ready for that. You're getting ahead of me. I'm doing my best to recognize the fact that you're my father. I'm not ready to be your son."
Not dialogue, but this line from page 231 gives you a good idea of what this entire book is like.
"One man, headless -- he had no head."
Reading this book was a chore. I'm not entirely sure why I finished it. If I had it to do over again I'd give up after about 50 pages. I thought it was just weird and would get better. It stayed weird and got worse. The ending does nothing to redeem it. It sounds like DeLillo has better books, but it will be a long time before I'm willing to give them a shot.