Tuesday, February 7, 2012

Jeschonek, Robert T. My Favorite Band Does Not Exist


Jeschonek, Robert T.    My Favorite Band Does Not Exist      
Clarion see Houghton Mifflin  2011  324p  16.99 978-0-547-37027-9     hs/adult    VG    Fantasy      
Idea Deity and Reacher Mirage share a destiny that is linked to the reality of “Fireskull’s Revenant,” a fantasy novel they have both been reading.   Readers may feel they’ve fallen down the rabbit hole, in a contemporary fantasy similar to “Through the Looking Glass.” Parallel universes collide when a hoax (the creation of a website offering elaborate details about a fictitious band) perpetuated by a webmaster on one world  actually mirrors the reality of a band in another plane of existence.  When characters cross between the two realities, the twin characters and their adversaries square off for battle. 

The convoluted plot which switches back and forth nearly every other chapter between “our” world and the “other” universe may be daunting for many readers.  In addition, chapters of an “omniversal” novel (”Fireskull’s Revenant”) are interspersed, and further complicate the action. The result is very complex, with three different but highly integrated plot lines, that weave in and out of each other, sharing characters and experiences as realities leak into each other.

The characters are difficult and confusing as well.  Our “heroes,” Idea (the webmaster) and Reacher (the band’s songsmith and lead singer) share a girlfriend (who is blonde from the front and brunette from the back or vice versa, depending upon which world she is in).  The girlfriend is the link between the two worlds and “Fireskull’s Revenant.”   Despite the graphic-novel-like plot, Idea (who suffers from a psychological complex in which he is convinced that he is trapped in a book and will die in Chapter 64) manages to rebel against the omniscient, and all-powerful author of his fate, and choose a destiny of his own. Hilary Welliver
       

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