This is not a long lost novel by Dostoevsky .. or even Carlton Mellick III. RnRBFOS is a light, fun romp involving slackers, rock n roll, outer space babes, Bondi Beach, sex, drugs, eating habits, multiple vaginas-on-demand, idiom confusion, green skin and antennae.
Sounds good? I personally find that fun, irreverent, ultra-hip fiction, especially anything that smacks of science fiction, quickly looses its flavor. Although often disappointing, this type of fiction is both appetizing and certainly fills a need for the general reading public (a bit above Mellick and far below Dostoevsky). I think I might try similar fiction but in the format of short stories.
The author, Linda Jaivin, is Australian (although born in Connecticut) and she has a tasty looking list of available titles so I urge you to check out her stuff; after all, billions of sentient creatures across the universe love this stuff and sometimes I’m just an old fart.
Here’s Jaivin’s bibliography. I notice from the Wikipedia entry that she also does work in translating or subtitling films and works from other Asia countries. Is “subtitles” a new genre?
Novels
Eat Me (1995)
Rock ‘n’ Roll Babes from Outer Space (1996)
Miles Walker, You’re Dead (1999)
Dead Sexy (2000)
The Infernal Optimist (2006)
A Most Immoral Woman (2009)
The Empress Lover (2014)
Works of non-fiction
New Ghosts, Old Dreams: Chinese Rebel Voices (1992)
Confessions of an S & M Virgin (1997)
The Monkey and the Dragon (2001)
Found In Translation: In Praise of a Plural World (2013)
Beijing (2014)
A Celebration of Reading 