Resentment: A Comedy by Gary Indiana

Resentment: A Comedy Reviews

• 
  Neil Griffin

  This reminded me of when I started reading earlier in my life when it seemed like every book I read would bring me an author who was doing totally new things that I didn't know could be done in lit. Back in the days of Barth, DFW, Flannery O'Connor, Marias, DeLillo, etc, where I was like a sponge in reading all all, to me, new and brilliant stuff. After reading quite a bit over many years, those experiences don't happen nearly as much as they did back when. That's why when I actually read a book that makes me want to check out the rest of the author's oeuvre, it strikes me as a big deal. It also makes me ask myself why the hell I haven't read Gary Indiana before and why I've barely heard of him. Somebody who writes this good and entertainingly should be read much more than he is--which is my assumption since some of his books are out of print.
  
  He happened to have an interview in Bookforum's summer issue that caught my eye, so I grabbed this book on a lark and really couldn't put it down. It's a hilarious, sad, disturbing, and eminently readable story with characters that, although often making terrible decisions, are wholly relatable to most of me, and I assume most of us who have spend a good part of our 20s and 30s doing questionable things in the strange city of Los Angeles. Speaking of, this is now my favorite LA novel by a mile. You can tell an author who writes about LA without actually living in the city. And Indiana nails all aspects, especially the slightly lurid underground of the city that is nowhere near the beach.
  
  I'm definitely checking out rest of his books.
• 
  Heronimo Gieronymus

  A kind of brawny, sprawling satirical screed encapsulating the 1990s gestalt in all its miserable fallen ignominy. We have a not-even-remotely veiled engagement w/ the famous trial of the Menendez brothers, a kind of insane griping at Indiana's contemporaries (the evisceration of Kathy Acker being particularly callow and delicious), and all kinds of bile heaped on a world that was heading ... well, here, where we now find ourselves. You would be hard-pressed to argue the thing wasn't prescient. There are a lot of different forms of nastiness at play here that I am confident will stand up to the nastiness of anyone else.
• 
  Tim Hilbert

  Ryan Murphy thinks he is going to do this with his Menendez crime Story show isn’t he.
• 
  Anna Walsh

  Incredible! Poisonous and thrillingly sharp. I’ve found Indiana’s fiction hard to bear in his other novels, but the satirical element to Resentment grounds all the malice and horror to stunning, humane effect. Beautifully written and really important gay writing. If Andrew Holleran and the other Violet Quill writers were important to chronicle the sadness and ridiculousness of being a doomed queen in the 70s, Indiana expresses the disturbed, tense role of the fag in the latter end of the century, particularly the fag who is past it, beyond the point of no return.
• 
  Seth

  The best and funniest book about anxiety, depravity and regret that I have ever read and may ever read.
• 
  Danny Epstein

  this was one of the best novels I’ve ever read. Funny, depraved, smart, creative, tragic, and absolutely entertaining throughout. Gary Indiana is my new favorite.
• 
  Man Oh Man I Am Reading A Book

  literary bratpack hangeron messing around with something bizarre & academic
• 
  Nick Melloan-ruiz

  Stunning
• 
  Giib Glib

  This is a pleasant surprise. A great writer, tragically underrated.
• 
  m

  gets a little lost in the sauce at times, another thing this book has in common with your household pizza cutter. would be 3* except, like denis cooper, indiana's writing fits all of my literary interests (unwell homosexual comedy), funny & fun writing if nothing else. i blew through it in a couple afternoons
• 
  Dj Armacost

  Ultra-dark and excellent. Despite the style being somewhat unconventional (pages upon pages without paragraph breaks, run-on sentences etc.), I found the novel very readable and engrossing. The prose is scathing and often profound and insightful- almost beautiful even though themes deal heavily with trauma, abuse and self-hatred. The book is not for everyone.
• 
  Gareth Schweitzer

  This a great book! A lovely bunch of gay characters mixed up with an OJ style murder trial...and a few genuinely unexpected and shocking moments! Highly recommended... especially in advance of Oscar Pistorius's trial!
• 
  Joanna

  It was kind of fun to identify the real people many of the characters are based on (I got Dominick Dunne, John Gregory Dunne, Joan Didion and Ingrid Sischy, but somehow missed Tom Hanks), but otherwise this book is a chronicle of misery and I gave up about 3/4 of the way through.
• 
  Malcolm

  This was my second attempt at a novel by this writer. I absolutely loved his work as art critic for the Village Voice. Can't stand his novels.
• 
  Oscar David López

  Un maestro de la técnica que puede mixear la no-ficción y la ficción. Cabe destacar que la traducción de Anagrama no está nada mal.