Word: metaphor
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Nicholson constructs the book as a series of vignettes that ricochet between various times and modes of exposition--several scenes are unveiled as journal entries--but that all converge on London. Not surprisingly, the city becomes the novel's catchall metaphor, and therein lies the book's essential problem: to complete the metaphor, the characters get stitched rather awkwardly into the narrative, as if merely to cover holes in its fabric, and the clumsiness of their insertion detracts from the clever manipulations of Nicholson's plot...
Take Judy Tanaka. Ostensibly the first character proffered up to the reader, Judy hamhandedly announces her role in the book to her therapist in the opening pages: "It's not just a metaphor. Look at me. Don't I remind you of anything?... It doesn't need a genius to see what's going on. Greater London, c'est moi." Fittingly, the city will be the meeting place between Judy and the novel's hero-oid, Mick...
Above all she will be remembered as a phenomenon of pure stardom. Her death was a terrible metaphor for that condition. She takes her place, among the broken glass and crushed metal, in the iconography of the crash, alongside James Dean, Jayne Mansfield and Princess Grace. These other victims, however, died unpursued. They weren't fleeing the pointed end of their own celebrity: men on motorcycles with computerized cameras and satellite-linked mobile phones. The paparazzi are the high-tech dogs of fame. But it must be admitted that we sent them into that tunnel, to nourish our own mysterious...
...weeks later, Carey fired her longtime manager, Randy Hoffman, and attorney, Alan Grubman, both of whom happen to be close associates of Mottola's. "I've grown up," she explains. "It's been a gradual process of gaining creative control." So who can resist seeing Honey as a metaphor for Carey's personal declaration of independence? Well, actually, Carey herself. "It's just a James Bond spoof," she insists. "The actors weren't meant to be Tommy or anybody else...
...years don't know how good they have it during Orientation Week, nor will they know it until afterward. As in that first junior-high dance, they tentatively step onto the parquet floor, nervously approach their classmates and ask them what activities they did in high school (well, the metaphor breaks down after a while). Only once the Orientation Week dance is over do they realize how much fun they...