You Don’t Love Me Yet by Jonathan Lethem

I got this as a Christmas present thanks to its inclusion on my Amazon Wishlist. It was place there on the strength of The Fortress of Solitude, a cracking Lethem novel I read a year or two back.

This book was a very different kettle of fish!

It’s set in LA that city of dreamers, of people who are looking for their break in acting, music, or whatever. It follows the life and loves of Lucinda, a twenty something wannabe who hangs out with her pals, Denise, Bedwin and Matthew who play together in an Art Rock band that are nameless at the start. Lucinda starts the book off trying to dump Matthew, her on-off boyfriend, again and manages to succeed despite a goodbye grope.

She is about to start a new job for art gallery owner/entrepreneur, Falmouth who has designed a new installation called Complaints. He had advertised a telephone number all across LA just calling it Complaints. He has employed Lucinda and others to man the telephone and take anyone’s complaint, although not doing anything about them. Neat idea?

Lucinda gets hung up on one guy who complains all the time and she bends the rules and gets his number, eventually meeting and bedding him. All fine and well.

But then she decides to use some of the one liners and words he uses to form the basis of songs she writes with the band’s songwriter, Bedwin. They end up writing a few numbers which come off really well.

Of course, they then premier the new songs at a party thrown by Falmouth and go down a storm. Its at the party that the Complainer AKA Carlton Vogelsong, hears his words being used and inveigles his way into the band.

The book goes on from there. Its not a very long read but is very entertaining in its own way and manages to say something about LA society (I think). It is very strange sometimes with its subplots. For example, Matthew takes in a maladjusted kangaroo called Shelf from the zoo he works at and looks after at while the zoo deny an animal has gone missing.

Some of the scenes are very handled and put across very vividly eg the party the band play at is quite exciting.
This book does make me want to read more Jonathan Lethem but when that will be I don’t know since my shelves are already bulging with unread boo