White Noise by Don DeLillo
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I didn't read this because of the recent adaptation. Hell, I didn't even know there was one until after I read it. All I knew, coming in, was that Delillo is considered a traditional-fiction literary great by a number of people and I hadn't read him. Hell, I even picked this title out of the rest of his randomly.

I'll say this, though: by the time I got to the mid-way point in the book, before anything momentous like an airborne event happened, I was pretty much hovering between boredom and mild, wry amusement. Hell, even the amusement couldn't help but compare this novel unfavorably against Stephen King, whose social commentary was rather more biting and whose satire at least had the edge to cut, unstintingly, rather than pull back, weak-willed and ultimately considerate, even in a killing stance. Yes, White Noise wasn't a killer.

Sure, the whole book is ostensibly about death and its themes are everywhere, touching everywhere, but lightly, timidly, like a virgin.

Frankly, I found myself just wishing the novel would go all-out with what it was set-up to be: a horror. It might have even shone with something deeper. Or perhaps I've read too many truly excellent horrors (especially from the same mid-80's crop) to consider this safe novel all that deep.

Don't get me wrong. It's like finding any well-written book in the wild that captures your imagination that happens to be so awfully similar to another--the difference is which you read first, which caught your soul first. Maybe in another life, I'd poo-poo King in favor of this milder, main-stream stare-in-death's-face novel without any hint of the childish Other or a Supernatural element. But nope. I like my spicy food. This just didn't have enough punch.

My synesthesia really got a good kick of 80s bubble gum and the feel of tweed under my fingers.


Personal note:
If anyone reading my reviews might be interested in reading my own SF, I'm going to be open to requests. Just direct message me in goodreads or email me on my site. I'd love to get some eyes on my novels.

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