Another Dual Review

Larry Pick: Downtown Owl by Chuck Klosterman

Dark and funny, masterfully nuanced picture of desperation is this first novel by Klosterman who has written much non-fiction including Sex, Drugs & Cocoa Puffs and Fargo Rock City. Introducing Owl, ND, population 600 in the autumn of 1983, a place and time which is déjà vu to all of us. I especially identified with Mitch, just an ordinary high school boy, whose fate in the flash storm of February 1984 is not even mentioned in the local news article – an omission that basically sums up the life of every ordinary person in a small town continuously grasping for a place in history.

He recommended it to Carolyn who says, in addition,

Ditto, except I don't identify with Mitch as much as he does, and moreso with the music and mannerisms of the time, because I was of that same age. I don't believe you have to be of that age to enjoy and "get" it, but if you are, you will, like me, certainly derive a certain additional sense of ownership to the perspective of new teacher/resident Julia and those of all the Owl High Schoolers.

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