Thoughts on "The Pilot" by Joshua Ferris

I thought Joshua Ferris' first book Then We Came To The End was really good. It reminded me vividly about my time working at an internet company during the first bubble. He captured the group-think mood spread and mob mentality of office work-spaces perfectly. And some of the characters were lovely. Not all, but some. And it was occasionally very funny.

I began reading his story, "The Pilot", with a sense of recognition which made me happy. I could completely relate to Lawrence, the main character and struggling TV writer, and his social anxiety. The sense of place, that LA malaise, is pretty dead on, although I think the workhorse musician roomie was a little TOO dead on. But who hasn't experienced the feeling, particularly before a big party at which you are sure to be a minor player, of not belonging? LA amplifies that feeling by about a thousand. Lawrence's insecurity about the state his career and his place in his world is certainly familiar, and I smiled at his worry. It felt true.

I think the story spun out a little at the bar- I feel like making him an alcoholic was too much, as if Ferris needed to load Lawrence with baggage beyond his own anxiety and fears- but quickly righted itself at the party. Lawrence's appropriation of the dress and manner of Friday Night Lights character, Coach Eric Taylor, as a protective uniform is desperate and funny. (Would it have been funnier if he was not an alcoholic? I think so). And who hasn't played a gentler, subtler game of that, lightly borrowing from friends and icons as a form of "faking it until you make it"? Everyone has their "party" self- the bubbly person they hope to always be.

I particularly liked the conversation between Lawrence and Kate Lotvelt, the party host and successful TV writer/producer. Lawrence is dying to say something specific- in fact he has gone to the party to ask her this very thing- but he loses his nerve, can't find the right opening, and contents himself with the mere conversation. I have totally done that, and Ferris got it right- that feeling of failure combined with an odd joy at having been spoken to at all, and kindly at that. Its awful.

But as the end of the story approach, I began to read with horror. Poor Lawrence. It felt all wrong, and like a writer's way out of a corner. Lawrence's descent is very well written, but hideous and too over the top for such a well observed story. Why does the ending have to be so absolute, when the story is about degrees of things? I think there's a weird hidden morality- Lawrence falls off the wagon, and is cruelly punished. This works against the sensitivity of the story. It's like kicking a puppy for eating a hot dog. But maybe the discomfiting ending, and it's spiral away from the expected, is a good thing?