Tristin Egolf Skirt and the Fiddle Reading at Powell’s on Hawthorne Tues Oct 22, 7:30 pm
T ristan Egolf’s first novel, Lord of the Barnyard, received press and praise all over the place for being bold and new and fresh and inventive. But no one is going to be saying such things about his second novel.
In Skirt and the Fiddle, Egolf retains but one element from his successful debut: tone. He maintains a tone in the book that feels vibrant and alive. Charlie, the narrator, speaks with a mix of college academia and ambiguous slang. He sounds so hip, you try to forget that you don’t know what the hell he’s talking about half the time. “Picture one Cambodian/Negro fiddle stooge in a shrunken tux on a funky chicken through a mile of white lightning,” says Charlie at one point, and you just nod your head and pretend you get it, because if you don’t, you just ain’t with it.
Unfortunately, It’s not just Charlie’s vocabulary that’s confusing–the topics of his chatter don’t make any sense either. Take, for instance, this sentence when he enters a fancy-pants restaurant: “To our left, an image of Tony Bennett appeared in a doorway, drawing its curtain.”
What is an “image” of Tony Bennett? A painting? Tony Bennett himself? A Tony Bennett look alike? What’s the purpose of this reference? Tony Bennett is kind of funny looking, but without any kind of setup or further explanation, the reference is utterly meaningless.
Everything in this book is meaningless. The plot–which follows Charlie and his anarchist friend Tinsel Greetz as they do crazy things like kill sewer rats–somehow feels boring, despite all its zaniness. There’s also an entirely improbable love interest, Louise, whom Egolf thrusts into the story to drive a wedge between Charlie and Tinsel. The event spurns a conclusion that feels rushed and awkward.
To top things off, Egolf carries his obnoxious/annoyingly hip attitude into the book’s very font. He insists on using italics, caps, and bold print to inform the reader EXACTLY how a sentence should be read. It’s like picking up a used copy of a book and finding that some asshole has marked it all up. M. WILLIAM HELFRICH