Neck Deep and Other Predicaments: Essays

One of the greatest appeals to Monson's writing is his plentiful use of humor. Monson's language is entertaining and full of reality. His use of pulling the definition of a dedication and appendix for this book from The Chicago Manual of Style, 13th edition, had me laughing from the beginning to the end, especially since I am an English major!Monson's writing is diverse in subject, from mining to car washes, and his use of the essay form is effective. Because he touches on so many everyday images and subjects, I think he is able to find threads of connection to many people. Despite his wide range of interests, the writing is cohesive and strangely connected on multiple levels.The visual appeal in the text itself is a wonderful way of using and breaking traditional essay form. In "Outline Toward a Theory of the Mine Versus the Mind and the Harvard Outline," "I Have Been Thinking About Snow," "Index for X and the Origin of Fires," and "Failure: A Meditation Another Iteration (With Interruptions)," Monson blurs the poetry and visual artistry in simple ways by using line breaks, indentation, and series of ellipses.In "The Long Crush" he delves into his passion for disc golf. He is gracious enough to take the time to explain the difference between a Frisbee and a golf disc as well as explains the logistics of the sport. The essay is personal and full of facts, both of which create a voice for Monson that intrigues the reader.

Polito does it again. Last year he picked out a great book by Kate Braverman (FREQUENT TRANSMISSIONS) to be the first winner of a brand new creative nonfiction prize adminstered by august Graywolf Press, and this year he comes back with another book of essays, NECK DEEP by Michigander Ander Monson. There seems to be a pattern here and I wonder if a full-length study or essay of book length, a monograph in fact, has any chance of winning the contest next year around? Like Braverman, Monson looks at the ordinary things in life, like going to the dentist, and shows how extraordinary they are.He is inventive and fecund, and. I suspect, could no more stop writing than an ant can stop carrying that rubber tree plant. If a subject seems intractable at first, he will push and prod his way around it until he has found a way in, and his take no prisoners manner is just right for the big assault on consciousness required of the essay form at this point in its history. We're all tired of the old Emersonian ramble and want to get on to the new, "next-er" type of formation as pioneered by John D'Agata. Sometimes Monson leads us to places in which the sound of his own voice both booms and mores, as his announcement that "I've always been fascinated with the sound and sight of shattering glass." We don't automatically get fascinated with his fascination, and yet usually he pulls the chestnuts out of the fire with a few quick apercus and starts again. That's his method, the old "if at first" method. He loves water, he tells us, but then saves himself from ignominy by making some provocative links between alphabetical order and the formlessness of the shower versus the bath.If I hsve a complaint, it would be that Monson's admirably restless mind has not, after all, innumerable tracks, and that he can be at times a sort of Johnny One Note. First he finds that boarding school "is all about control." Then he finds out that dentistry "is all about control." Those who expect their essays to come with epiphanies will not be disappointed by the curve of Monson's thinking, but by book's end you want him to find something that, in the long run, is not "all about control." However he is a professor after all, and probably that's no accident either.Hopefully Graywolf will continue presenting us with annual volumes, edited by Polito, in which creative nonfiction, the old nonfiction gussied up with postmodern writing tricks developed in fiction MFA workshops, geta a chance to shine. I will also look forward to successfive books by Monson, for there will be no stopping him now, I can just tell.

It's complex and a little "busy", but still very cool. I like how playful it is.

This is an Uber-Cool collection of essays! Ander knows it, I know it, now you should find out what you're missing, too!This book makes me fall in love with my home state- I'm an already obsessed Michigan native... god, what a great state this is! and now it is summer, whoohoo!- and makes me wanna crow from the top of a mountain... or the roof of my car while in motion and I'm surfing on it.Ander knows what a strange place Michigan is to live, in particularly the Upper Peninsula. You'll hear all he has to say on the subject. You'll find out what a circuitry-crook he is, too. He's toodling with unseen and unspoken things here. Day to day experiences, as seen in this book, are often metaphors for life and countless other things. He's aware of what a big state, country, planet, universe this is. I dig that. It blows my mind like the stage lights at the Phish shows I used to go to.I'm a particular fan of these essays: "Outline towards a theory of mine versus the Mind and the Harvard Outline", "Cranbrook Schools" and "Subject to Wave Action".As a writer myself, this book has made me realize that there are no limitations in form, that the obnoxiously white page can be a vehicle for design. Maybe someday when I am a better writer I can dismiss my naive ideas of traditional form and create something spectacular, but till that day...Good stuff. Peace.