Ottessa Moshfegh, My Year of Rest and Relaxation.

- This novel is raw and gritty - virtually a Sally Rooney on steroids. It is exceptionally well-written and immensely engaging.  

- A nameless young woman, an only child brought up by wealthy, cold and distant, recently deceased parents, bullied by an arrogant, self-entitled, sexually abusive, Wall St yuppie boyfriend, but who can’t find it within herself to leave him, is ‘pretty, thin and white’ but, perhaps understandingly, depressed. All she wants to do is watch Hollywood movies and popular TV shows, and sleep, day and night. As for the daily news - politics, crime, disasters - she opts for the off button.

- We are treated to an existential binge on mindless popular culture. In the end she’s reduced to becoming an art installation perpetrated by a modish artist acquaintance. A more accurate title would have been ‘My Year of Stupidity and Degeneration’. 

- Her psychiatrist, Dr Tuttle, is, ironically, a nutter. She’s a comic portrait, but also a standing savage critique of the psychiatric profession. It’s all pills, pills, pills, and missing any substantial professional diagnosis of the woman’s condition. And of course the pills counteract each other, especially when combined with the constant intake of coffee and alcohol. 

- Her best friend, Reva, is a delightfully whacky portrait of a New York Jewish girl. Addicted to cheap fashion and junk food. But she's sane and a perfect friend.

- The New York setting is telling. Moshfegh captures the shabby character and pulse of the street as well as the ultra-trendy clubs and bars of the rich kids of the hollow ‘art-party’ set. It's the end of the 20th century.

- The story tragically ends on 9/11. Reva was in the twin towers. 



Some publishing notes: 

1.Outrageously overpriced for a 290pp paperback. It’s $35.00 but should be no more than $29.99. The publisher, Penguin Random House, is obviously using the weakening A$ as an excuse to ratchet up its prices. But ironically the current A$/£ exchange rate (0.55p) is close to its average over the last five years. And the standard pricing formula for an imported title, FX rate x 1.1 (hedge) x 1.1 (GST), makes the price close to $29.99 after rounding.  

2. And the binding is the worst! It takes enormous arm strength or a crowbar to hold open because of the excessive glue on the spine, which won’t crack no matter how much pressure you apply. 

3. The title is just wrong. Like probably many people, I passed over it when I saw it on the bookshop shelf six months ago, as I quite logically judged it a lame, new-age, self-help book describing a search for emotional equilibrium or something. It's nothing of the sort. It's as  sharp as a tack.