Memory Piece

Normally bleak is a plus for me but here it was the kind of bleak that depressed me even though part of me felt it was a needed one.

I'm also sort of conflicted about the part of the book that Focused on Giselle, on the one hand I thought it was way too long but on the other hand I'm not exactly sure how it could have been made shorter without losing some if its point.

Three preteen girls meet at a Fourth of July BBQ in the 80's which marks the beginning of their loosely intertwined lives. From there they being to forge distinct paths for themselves that frame the three sections of the book.

Giselle Chin is a performance artist seeking to fully become an art monster, Jackie Ong is a coder trying to build and sustain an online community, and Ellen Ng is a commune living squatter eking out an existence at the edges of society. All three are creatives in a world that pushes back against the purity of the work and any hope of escaping the clutches of capitalism. Their work is compromised in some way, inevitable in the world of art and technology, but even in the dystopian future, Ellen's punk ethos still can't completely escape big corporate.

But it's about navigating that reality and emerging into the possibility of something better. That capitulation may be inevitable, but there still remains the chance of something more. The project is ever ongoing.