I don't even know what to say about this thing. 

Okay, so this "thing" is basically a very small (might I say chic?) novella filled to the brim with dry, dead-pan humor and obnoxious details about the main character Sam's life. Sam is Taiwanese-American and very tired of life - which clearly shows given Lin's prose. It starts and ends with nothing particularly special, and everything in between stays at a constant "nothing really special". The entire novella is riddled with random facts and observations about everyday life, with basically zero explanation of why things are going on. 

When I read it, it seems like a diary written by a very dry young man - and then he took scissors to cut out random parts of his day. And then he put the rest back together into this book. 

Have I made it sound interesting yet?

No. 

Tao Lin gives you nothing except the everyday happenings of a young adolescent who is very bad at life. What does seem interesting, though, is how one interprets these few pages. Given many Gmail chat conversations, statements of "being ed", casually announced thoughts about killing himself, and mundane facts atrociously littered as if in a state of ADHD... what do you think the author wanted you to know?

[Now for my opinion:]

I personally have no idea what I just read. It is confusing as hell, given I'm the type of writer who enjoys long trains of thought and indulging in details. Originally, I wanted very badly to conclude that I had just read utter nonsense. However, Lin is simply giving me what I've never had: a first hand account of what it feels like to be a young, 20-something year old boy, and suicidal. Really, I've never had an inkling idea of how it feels to be any of that, and now I can very professionally say that it seems like it .

 I think this novella - whose TITLE is even a mundane fact in the story of Sam's life - tries to highlight and criticize the ridiculousness and uselessness of how young people act and live their lives in the modern world. It reminds me of a college graduate horror story: you are with very little money, very little love, and very little direction. People always say inspiration is important - but the character Sam is a clear depiction of what random moments of inspiration without motivation looks like: an aimless life full of apathy for anything except useless sh*ts and giggles. 

The novel begins with Sam having no purpose in life (what he and his friends very originally called "being ed") and ends with him having no purpose in life. After reading ~90 pages about making arbitrary decisions and wasting time, I'm feeling very motivated to NOT waste any more of mine. 

If you've already read the book, or just grabbed it, leave comments below telling me what you think about the book and my analysis!