I am not going to put a spoiler-alert here, because I am not going to reveal the ending. One needs to savor Kio Stark's Follow Me Down from start to finish.  Having someone paraphrase Memento is surely not as evocative as watching it. Even the ending of Tale of Two Cities has deeper resonance after reading it through. Sure, the ending of Crying of Lot 49 may piss you off, but that’s by design. The point here being that the "pay-off" at the end of the book is part and parcel of the whole experience. Follow the narrator down. Good title, indeed.

Jeff Sharlet tweeted that the book was investigative fiction, or documentary existentialism, and I responded it was hard-boiled epistemology. It does read like a Chandler or Hammett book, with the grinding rhythm of a Philip Marlowe. It appears the narrator is far more lovely than Humphrey Bogart though. Who knows for sure tho, eh? There are three aspects to the novel that resonate for me.

The first is that damned envelope. The gnawing, grinding feeling  that certain objects give to you. That dogged compulsion when you put all your crap into piles a) keep b) maybe keep c) throw away ... , and then you stare at the c) pile and realize it ain't gonna happen. Or a keychain with a band logo on it. That love letter you “threw away.” Or a worry stone. The envelope comes into the story and then it sits around, it waits on the refrigerator. There is so much suspense built up simply on the opening of the damn thing. That, and the basic and furtive descriptions of place that seem to refer to actual brick buildings but also hint at some grey-scaled every-city-of-every-film-noir-filmed. Physical objects and the world of them have a power all their own within the book, a solid world that also invokes mystery, as objects and brick houses and empty fields plainly draw you in.

Second, the small interactions and descriptions of casual encounters rings very true—but how can that be? Again, no spoilers but the whole drawn out meandering mystery trail spawned by the envelope finally feels like gossamer threads , insubstantial and verging on snapping. We see only a brief glimpse of the monster behind the dumpster, Citizen Kane shadows in a rows of shadows. On the other hand—brief conversations with boyfriends, coworkers, people on the street, neighborhood guys feel real and complete, even though they comprise only a few sentences. Kio does a lot of work with stranger interactions and brief encounters. There is a sense that these fleeting glimpses of truth—well, that's all we get folks. The only real knowledge will come at you in brief sporadic spurts, randomly and most likely from an actual living breathing person. Perhaps training yourself in reading facial ticks and eye-movement might be your best and wisest move. Otherwise envelopes will lead you down rabbit holes. One cannot weave a complete tapestry of the world, these territories are not listed on the map in your pocket, trust instead that catcall from the construction worker or the brief hand and reassuring smile of a complete stranger after an earthquake. You cannot know the Master, but you can tickle his creatures, as someone  once said.

Third, the character name of Madder is just fantastic. Madder—growing increasingly frustrated, Madder—growing increasingly insane, and if you say it a few times it gets a little harder and turns into Matter—the heart of things. It's one of those words that spins out based on the quirky (quarky?) turn of phrase modulated by human speech and language. In a world where brief hints guide the narrator to the next destination and warnings only increase her desire to know, the multiple meanings of this one word hint at the difficulty in such a quest. Of course, this reading is only from a reader’s point of view, the narrator herself notes the name, but never applies such relevance to it. She overlookes, perhaps, an important piece of information. Kio Stark’s use of language does make the whole trip more enjoyable tho. Indeed, certain phrases, quotable lines, and bon-mots flow seamlessly in the narration, speaking directly to the reader. There may be a tale within a tale here, where the author is using the story to teach me something about the inability to be taught something. I get madder just thinking about it.

Finally, a reviewer mentioned that the book ending will leave you either enlightened or infuriated. And it will. Either one or the other at a time  as you run it run it through, stopping the film reel and playing it back in your mind. But most likely it will leave you both, because we live in a world of un-opened envelopes and small truths. That may be all we have to cling to. It may not be necessary, indeed may even be harmful, and perhaps futile, to imagine and seek a deeper story and harder truth waiting to be exposed at the end of the street, hidden in a gated field, or ...maddeningly... within someone we best not know, even if that means pasting together truth from bits and pieces, hints and allegations.

Given the circumstances we see ourselves thrown into: best to have a Red Fizzy and enjoy some music and words tonight at the Bell House, Gowanus, Brooklyn, surrounded by the empty fenced lots that inspire the novel with Kio Stark in attendance celebrating the release of her book. Tuesday,Sept 6^th. 7pm.

http://www.thebellhouseny.com/calendar.php