“Hello there. Sorry to bother you, but I won the Nobel Prize for Physics last year. I’m wondering if you have any temp work.”
“Well, we’re always filling positions.”
“Great! I was just looking for something to get by for a few weeks. Is there anybody I could speak to? I’d be delighted to meet with you. I’m happy to take any typing or computer tests.”
“Do you have any experience?”
“I spent ten years studying the symmetry of extended tachyon-based objects. My findings are being taught in several upper-division classes. But, you know, forget all that. I’m happy to work in the filing room. I just need a few weeks of work.”
“Well, I’m sorry. As you know, it’s been much slower than usual.”
“But I thought you said you were filling positions.”
“We’re always filling positions.”
“I have letters of reference from Michio Kaku and Neil deGrasse Tyson, and I graduated within the top 1% of my class.”
“Yes, that’s nice. Just email us your resume, and we’ll contact you in three weeks if you qualify.”
“My rent is due in three weeks, and I have no savings.”
“It was a pleasure chatting with you! I’m sure you’ll do just fine. A talented guy like you? Just hang in there and stay the course. Prosperity is just around the corner! And never shake the audacity of hope!”
The Call by Yannick Murphy: The always interesting author of Here They Come and Signed, Mata Hari returns with a novel that whips up a worldview from a rather quirky set of limitations: namely, the call logs that a veterinarian maintains as his son is unexpectedly put into a coma and an unforgiving economy denies him work. What emerges is a surprisingly optimistic, often funny, and very moving account on how one family uses acceptance and forgiveness as a way to atone for hard knocks. (
Birds of Paradise by Diana Abu-Jaber: Forget Franzen and Eugenides. If you're looking for a social novel that counts, Diana Abu-Jaber is the author you're looking for. Building from the free-form exploration of consciousness and identity in Crescent and the gripping procedural structure of Origin, Abu-Jaber's latest novel is her finest, equally fluent with gutterpunk culture and smarmy real estate men. It has been suggested by The Washington Post's Ron Charles that you will likely gain some pounds while reading this novel. This is certainly true. Abu-Jaber's description of food is so precise that it often made me want to do more cooking. But I very much admired the way in which Abu-Jaber presents all her characters as unwitting victims of rough capitalism, which permits them some dignity even as they perform terrible acts.
The Last of the Live Nude Girls by Sheila McClear: This memoir isn't so much about the decline of the Times Square peepshow, as it is about one young woman's efforts to pull herself up by by her bootstraps when presented with few economic options. Filled with self-introspective candor and a quiet dignity, McClear's story is one that might befall any of us in these volatile times. While McClear does get back on her feet, her book leads one contemplating the terrible fates of other young women now moving to New York and falling into deadlier vocations. (
In a situation like this, you just have to stay positron.