Now that was a story. I have just discovered that the best possible compliment for a novel is not to call it a book, but to call it a story. This occurred to me because the entire time that I was reading David Gilmour‘s Extraordinary, I kept referring to it as my story. 

-What are you doing? Reading my story.

-Darling, what’s for breakfast? Coffee. Can you pass me my story?

The structure of Extraordinary was obvious and simple. We know what’s going to happen from the get-go. The reader is simply present for the journey. Even that isn’t all that outrageous. It’s plain, warm and tangible, extremely insightful – but not extraordinary.

I guess that’s what the author was getting at by calling it that. It’s extraordinary how we never get tired of the story of ourselves–that same old thing, worn out and faded. A favourite blanket. We don’t want to give it up, and yet we are fascinated to find out who we’d be without it. Our narrator has to confront a love for an old song that he will never hear again. We get to hear that song with the ears of someone who should have been appreciating it the whole time it was playing. And we do.

But enough of the sappy metaphors. This was a good book. I read it in two sittings. I bet you will too.

Never mind, of course all of David Gilmour’s PR troubles. I have no idea what the latest is on that. I imagine that it’s all been sensationalized quite a bit. And while I doubt he deserves it all, I think that people are ready to pounce on slips and badly put thoughts for good reason. It’s perfectly rational to expect people who have been treated unfairly, and who are told that they aren’t to grow weary, intolerant and defensive.

I for one am extremely put out with the old boys club of which Gilmour is a member, but I can look past it enough to know a good story when I read one. And this is a good enough reason to hang up your activist hat for a moment and just be an art lover.

Enjoy the art. And lets hope that everyone can just turn down the suck, eh?
~This is my entire political perspective in a nutshell, btw.

Next up in the GBC: Lisa Moore’s Caught.