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Songs of Insurgency presents a patchwork view of the post-9/11 zeitgeist. In these stories, the world is being dismantled: fear segues to paranoia, alienation to sadism, suicide, or a droning, dial-tone numbness. Theories of jihad quote Wittgenstein as the tiki bar's cover band rehashes a soundtrack of clichés. One character scans through radio channels at night, longing for the fulfillment of apocalyptic fantasy. Another drives ever westward, hotel after hotel, the details of each locale uneasily similar, repetitious. Yet amid all this dislocation and unease, just audible above the fake moans of the phone-sex line, some image of an alternative, authentic existence tests its wings.
Posted March 3, 2008
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