How strange: this is the second book I've read this year purporting to warn against the evils of social media (the first, of course, being The Circle). I chose this title for our bookclub at the beginning of the year after having read a blurb promising it was about a dentist who discovers that someone is impersonating him online, and who soon realizes the impersonator may be living his own life better than he is.
An intriguing premise, but unfortunately the blurb was written well before publication of the book and it is not an accurate description of the content.
Yes, Paul C O'Rourke, dentist, depressive, serial lover of women and their religious families, does discover soon into the novel that he is being impersonated online by someone who is au fait with social media in a way that O'Rourke himself is not and does not wish to be. But the story from there does not revolve around this identity theft in the comical way the publisher promised. Instead, the impersonator creates an identity for O'Rourke that is alternative from his actual identity in one important respect: whilst O'Rourke's defining drive throughout his life has been striving to find a place, belief system or a family in which he will find a sense of true belonging, the faux-O'Rourke has already discovered where he belongs and is not afraid to proclaim it loudly.
Don't get me wrong: Ferris does deal with the problem of identity theft in the new world. There is a period in the novel during which O'Rourke is so troubled by what is happening that he calls a lawyer, the police, internet experts and so on, seeking redress against the impersonator. What is fascinating is the cold hard truth that there's not much he can do - and not much anyone could do in similar circumstances. The impersonator does not defame him. On the contrary, he builds up his reputation as a dentist, he creates a webpage for O'Rourke's practice where before there was none. The impersonator does not rob him (except of his online identity) or damage him. So what recourse does O'Rourke have against this act? It is a question worth pondering.
But Ferris quickly moves on from this modern dilemma. Whilst O'Rourke is initially shocked by the falsity of what is being broadcast in his name, he soon becomes intrigued by it. The impersonator claims (as O'Rourke) to be a descendant of a long lost tribe of oppressed people, called the Ulms. This is a group, claims the faux O'Rourke, that has been more oppressed than even the Jews. It is the group that suffered the first genocide, recorded in the Bible. Fragments of documents are gradually parceled out, enticing O'Rourke into believing that he does in fact have a meaningful history, a past, a place in society. Having always felt lost, it is captivating to O'Rourke, this fairytale of oppression and meaning. He quickly becomes obsessed with the notion that there is a way for him to go 'home' without needing to adopt the religion of a girlfriend or her family.
This obsession results in comical lapses of concentration at work, and Ferris is a brilliantly funny writer. Surprising hilarity ensues from horrific moments like O'Rourke coming out of a daze to find himself about to drill into a patient's mouth with no idea why. Or O'Rourke sitting in his own waiting room observing his receptionist at work and spying on his own patients whilst his staff look around for him wondering where he's got to. Or the moment when he absent-mindedly asks a patient for a stool sample instead of asking him to spit.
The comedy is balanced by pathos, and Ferris portrays O'Rourke beautifully as a poor lost soul. The core of O'Rourke's character is perhaps best described by the fact that, when he was a little boy abandoned by his father, he couldn't bear the thought of being awake when everyone else was sleeping. He was eventually able to sleep only once apprised of the knowledge, imparted to him by his exhausted mother, that the Chinese are still awake on the other side of the world even when everyone in New York is asleep.
Most of the women in my bookclub found O'Rourke to be an unlikable character. I did not. It is true that he sometimes says the most despicable things. But so often when this happens he is actually trying very, very hard to say the right thing. When he comes across as anti-semitic to his ex-girlfriend's uncle, for example, he is actually trying to ingratiate himself into the family and decry the appalling things that have happened to the Jews throughout history. Other times he is brutally honest in a way that does not work in polite society. He is a complex character and I found O'Rourke to be strangely endearing.
Moreoever, O'Rourke is quite clearly an unreliable narrator. His own deep insecurity colours his telling of the story and the portrait he draws of himself. But it is clear from the way other characters relate to him - his long-suffering assistant Mrs Conway, for example, or Connie, his receptionist and ex-girlfriend - that they care deeply for him, in spite of the exasperation he causes them on a daily basis. And O'Rourke's relationship with Mrs Conway, an older, Catholic woman, is one of the highlights of the book. Ferris is so clever with dialogue. As readers, we are only ever exposed to one side of the conversations O'Rourke has with Mrs Conway, and so we are left to guess at what he might have said. It is an odd, highly original way of describing a conversation, and it works brilliantly well, giving rise to many of the funnier moments in the book.
O'Rourke's interest in his new religion is matched only by his lifelong attachment to the Boston Red Sox, and by the end of the book I had grown tired of both lengthy passages about baseball and heavy, pseudo-Biblical passages from the Ulm's religious text, the Cantaveticles (although I will concede that these read convincingly as the Uhr-text of a long-lost belief system). Neverthless, the depth of meaning Ferris conveys through a story that is funny and sad and wise all at the same time is comendable.
Overall assessment: 4 out of 5. This is a dense but enjoyable novel, but it is not for everyone. It is darkly satirical, in the vein of Shteyngart and O'Toole, and it therefore perhaps an acquired taste.
Cons: Lengthy excerpts of faux-religious drivel.
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