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Product Description
Quill & Quire
Writing about sex can be a tricky affair. The sexual act (and its corresponding emotional components) is both intimate and ridiculous, and if not approached with wit and grace, can appear absolutely ludicrous (see, for example, Paulo Coelho’s laughable Eleven Minutes).
Russell Smith understands sex, at least from the young white male perspective. The author’s previous fiction often commented on sexual mores (and his pornographic novel Diana: A Diary in the Second Person did quite a bit more); Girl Crazy puts the act and its consequences front and centre.
The novel focuses on Justin, a community college teacher who becomes obsessed with 20-year-old Jenna, whose sexual ferocity blinds him to her flightiness and legally questionable background. Justin is enthralled with her faintly dangerous lifestyle, but when the relationship ends, he continues to follow the corrupting path she set him on, and Smith’s tale morphs into a menacing and incisive search for self.
Smith excels at presenting the sexual fixations of the male psyche, slicing them apart and exposing the emotional impotence beneath. Justin, still an adolescent at heart, fetishizes each woman who crosses his path, living for “the fright of helplessness that he felt when he felt himself staring so hard at a woman who was not staring back: the feeling of seeping power … that you were the wailing infant, waiting for her to feed you.”
Of course, only half of Girl Crazy is a tale of sexual exploration; the other half is a satire of an educational system in which teachers find themselves hobbled by incompetent leadership, PR flaks, and a “stupid province-wide test designed by the kind of idiot who thinks Business English is a real subject.”
Justin’s personal transformation and some of the novel’s criminal elements lend Girl Crazy the air of a thriller à la Susanna Moore’s In the Cut. But Smith is more concerned with the psychological ramifications of hormonal obsession, and his exacting control over Justin’s odyssey from passive sexual spectator to active participant results in a story of scathing insight.
Review
"Daring and well executed. ... Most will likely fixate on the sex in Girl Crazy, and why not? Smith writes it well; nary a cringe-worthy adjective, and raw enough to be real. But Girl Crazy is more about class than it is about sex. ... Girl Crazy is a hot floor show for those of us desperate for the present to finally get its time in the Canadian literary spotlight." --Zoe Whittall, Globe and Mail
"His best novel yet. ... What Smith is saying here is that the literate, liberal culture ... is all but dead, replaced by loud, brash surfaces, primitive emotional needs and an almost demonic suburban sprawl. ... Girl Crazy is a frank and funny novel. The depiction of an emotionally stunted man's undignified lust for an even more immature young woman is disturbing and almost note-perfect. A lot of people won't like the novel's message, but they'd better learn to deal with it. The future is here and some might find it sexy, but it sure ain't pretty." --James Grainger, Toronto Star
"Girl Crazy rips a mile a minute. Smith has pulled off the sort of author-reader telepathy that lesser writers can only dream about. The book is ridiculously visceral. ... Smith has a good ear for dialogue and a finely honed sense of just how much detail to put in. And he writes a mean love scene. ... For all its graphicness, the most compelling thing about Girl Crazy is its honesty. Despite its raunch and raw emotion, the story's reality check stays firmly engaged. ... You'll probably have a hard time putting down Girl Crazy. It powers on to a conclusion that's both satisfying and oddly disquieting." --The Gazette (Montreal)
"A darkly comic study of fractured masculinity. ... The nicely ambiguous conclusion can be seen as either the recognition of a kind of atavistic male impulse, or a cautionary tale about the perils of pursuing desire to its most dangerous extreme." --Steven W. Beattie, The Walrus
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Most helpful customer reviews
4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Crazy fun,
By KvH (Toronto Canada) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Girl Crazy (Paperback)
Smith's gift as a writer is not only his flair with language, but his fearlessness. His latest book, Girl Crazy, is brutally frank in its depiction of male longing and mid-life confusion. The Toronto he so atmospherically depicts is a humid hellhole of cheap condo construction and failed multiculturalism, and his portrayal of the petty rivalries of small-time community college "academia" is a brilliant satirical send-up. But what makes Girl Crazy such crazy fun to read is that is also a hot and sexy romp that dares to walk on the wild side. Before reading this book, I must confess I never knew yoga pants were that much of a turn-on.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
A quick, unsophisticated read.,
By Janet in Toronto "jannie_b" (Toronto, ON Canada) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Girl Crazy (Paperback)
I loved Russell Smith's columns on men's style in the Globe and Mail, and so was interested to check out his fiction. This novel follows Justin, a thirty-ish English instructor at a community college in Toronto who stops to assist a young woman in distress, waiting for an ambulance on the street. He ends up accompanying her to the hospital, they become friends, and quickly more. This woman has, lets call them, issues, and his infatuation with her leads him into involvement with the underbelly of the city.
The story is simple and the reader can easily see what's coming ahead. Smith writes well, but his protagonist is obsessed with sex, seeing women's undergarments through their clothing, the effect of air-conditioning on female anatomy, etc etc. This constant stream of lingerie sighting is tiresome and after the first couple of times, unnecessary. We don't need it every time the man sits in a cafe or wanders down the college hallway. I enjoyed the unfolding of the relationship, but Justin seems unable to see what is staring the rest of us in the face. Presumably, this is where the title comes from. A quick, unsophisticated read. Not for the (sexually) faint of heart. Borrow it from the library if you think it would appeal.
2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
great read...,
By Martha B (Toronto< ON) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Girl Crazy (Paperback)
Loved it - exciting, sexy, daring and compulsively readable! Couldn't put it down, have been recommending it to friends (and now everyone here) for weeks...
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