⇒ PDF Gratis You Are Here A Memoir of Arrival Wesley Gibson 9780316740845 Books

You Are Here A Memoir of Arrival Wesley Gibson 9780316740845 Books

Download As PDF : You Are Here A Memoir of Arrival Wesley Gibson 9780316740845 Books

You Are Here A Memoir of Arrival Wesley Gibson 9780316740845 Books

This extraordinary small memoir is fiercely written--at once dark and crashingly funny.


Tags : You Are Here: A Memoir of Arrival [Wesley Gibson] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. A wonderfully original tale of the disintegration and mutation of an apparently ordinary American family.--Alison Lurie.,Wesley Gibson,You Are Here: A Memoir of Arrival,Back Bay Books,0316740845,Medical - General,Gibson, Wesley - Homes and haunts - New York (State) - New York,New York (N.Y.) - Intellectual life - 20th century,New York (N.Y.) - Social life and customs -,New York (N.Y.) - Social life and customs - 20th century,New York (N.Y.);Intellectual life;20th century.,New York (N.Y.);Social life and customs;20th century.,Novelists, American - 20th century,Novelists, American;20th century;Biography.,Young men - New York (State) - New York,20TH CENTURY AMERICAN NOVEL AND SHORT STORY,20th century,BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY Medical (incl. Patients),BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY Personal Memoirs,Biography,Biography & Autobiography,Biography Autobiography,BiographyAutobiography,GENERAL,General Adult,Intellectual life,Memoirs,New York,New York (N.Y.),New York (State),Non-Fiction,Novelists, American,Personal Memoirs,UNITED STATES LOCAL HISTORY,United States,Young men,Young men - New York (State) - New York,BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY Medical (incl. Patients),BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY Personal Memoirs,Personal Memoirs,Biography Autobiography,20th Century American Novel And Short Story,United States Local History,20th century,Biography,Gibson, Wesley,Homes and haunts,Intellectual life,New York,New York (N.Y.),New York (State),Novelists, American,Young men,Biography & Autobiography,BiographyAutobiography,Memoirs

You Are Here A Memoir of Arrival Wesley Gibson 9780316740845 Books Reviews

I didn't really think I'd enjoy this book because it was advertised in the New Yorker. Shallow reasoning eh? But anyhow a very good friend gave me a copy of Gibson's book for my birthday and so I felt I had to read it. Well let that be a lesson to me, from now on I will scour the New Yorker looking at all its ads, for this particular book, a cross between a memoir and a novel, turned out to be very good. I could not put it down, even though I had a zillion other things to do. I just kept reading as the day wore on and the sun went down and I had to fumble with the lamp to switch it on without diverting my attention from the page.

I felt I had to know what was happening with John, and what was up with Alan, and what was going to happen to Wesley once the full dimensions of John's illness became obvious. It isn't that the plot is so strong, indeed, hardly anything happens, so don't come to this book looking for Clive Cussler style action. No, it is Gibson's wonderful insight into all the little crazy things we humans do, that make the book so compelling. I feel not so much as that after reading his book I know Wesley Gibson, but rather that through some magical gift of X-ray vision into the heart, he knows me.

I used to live in New York so I'm familiar with the rat race of trying to find somewhere decent to rent. And who hasn't lived through the misery of having someone die on you; even if you aren't in love with them, it still knocks you on your ass. With his love of language and his discernment and humility, Wesley Gibson brings all these things right to the surface, the place where the reader and writer extend hands and touch fingertips.
For many young gay men who live in disparate communities around the country, New York City is the golden promise land that they strive to merge into once age and finances allow. The tale of an obscure individual arriving in the city with nothing and achieving fame beyond his wildest dreams has become an American myth. Wesley Gibson has written his own tale of travelling to the famous city where he hopes to establish himself as a writer. He lives under the threat that if he doesn't make it he will have to return to his hometown as a failure.
He casts the physical landscape of the city under the terms of a gay sensibility. For instance, he remarks "Central Park is Martha, as in George and Martha, braying at you, `I do not bray.' It's too much of muchness." In this redefinition of the city he marks it as his own territory. It's also a clever way for the author to introduce his environment as a character itself. While the tone of the book remains that of a memoir, the people Gibson encounters are transformed into eccentric characters that stand alongside the colourful caricatures of Dickens' fictional world. In fact by the end he remarks that he feels a growing kinship to one of Dickens' greatest tragic females. This fictional cast to his life is borne out of a self-consciousness playfulness that comes through in his thought process, usually spurred on by morbid premonitions of doom. After hardly speaking to his new roommate he is on the phone to a close friend fearing that he's moved in with an axe murderer. Dramatic events are conceived in his mind and then the reality of the city asserts itself as stranger than anything this writer could have imagined.
Gibson describes the typical life of a writer, where little actual writing is accomplished, and a mass of experience is acquired. To make ends meet he tries different jobs and finds a room through a gay housing agency. These lead to hilarious encounters which highlight the absurdities of life like in the best writing of David Sedaris. However, much of the book is also concerned with the serious problems Gibson encounters such as depression, AIDS and isolation. He finds that having abandoned the threatening homophobic environment of his home in Virginia, the liberal big city does little to comfort this gay man. His first potential romantic encounter turns out to be a hustler looking for money and a place to crash for the night. A potential roommate with a large collection of extremely anatomically correct GI Joe figures proclaims that Gibson isn't a normal gay man. This lingering resentment of being outcast for not conforming to a certain image of a gay man haunts the memoir. It leads me to believe that Gibson has a much bigger fictional work ahead of him.
Nevertheless, YOU ARE HERE remains a funny, thoughtful account that many people will no doubt identify with for it's witty observations of cosmopolitan life.
Maybe a requirement of reviewing a book is actually finishing it - but I just couldn't get through this one. The book basically details a gay man moving to New York and attempting to make it..... I thought it would be a great book, but I was mistaken. The author's language was obtuse... the phrase TRYING TOO HARD comes to mind.... I'm sorry Mr. Gibson if I am being unfair - I'll try to finish your next one.
This extraordinary small memoir is fiercely written--at once dark and crashingly funny.