The Novel Cure: From Abandonment to Zestlessness: 751 Books to Cure What Ails You (11 page)

Read
High Fidelity
and allow your heart to absorb the lessons from Rob’s—and your own—past mistakes. Are you going for the wrong sort of guys/girls? Are you failing to be the solid rock that your partner needs? Or are you living your love life to the wrong sound track? Get it right, and this breakup will be your last.

See also
:
Appetite, loss of
•
Bed, inability to get out of
•
Cry, in need of a good
•
Lovesickness
•
Sadness
•
Shelf, fear of being left on the
•
Tired and emotional, being

Call Me by Your Name
ANDRÉ ACIMAN

Wuthering Heights
EMILY BRONTË

The End of the Story
LYDIA DAVIS

This Is How You Lose Her
JUNOT DÍAZ

Heartburn
NORA EPHRON

The Love of My Youth
MARY GORDON

The End of the Affair
GRAHAM GREENE

High Fidelity
NICK HORNBY

Important Artifacts and Personal Property from the Collection of Lenore Doolan and Harold Morris, Including Books, Street Fashion, and Jewelry
LEANNE SHAPTON

Anna Karenina
LEO TOLSTOY

The Great Gatsby

F. SCOTT FITZGERALD

•   •   •

Money

MARTIN AMIS

•   •   •

Young Hearts Crying

RICHARD YATES

S
o you’re out of cash. That’s half the problem. Maybe you’re out of work (see: Unemployment; Depression, economic) or maybe you’re spending more than you earn (see: Extravagance). Either way, you’re convinced that if only you had a bit more money in the bank, all your problems would be solved. That’s the other half of the problem. We’ll deal with that half first.

James Gatz—aka Jay Gatsby—had the same stupid idea: that money would bring him what he most longed for, in this case, Daisy Buchanan. In ill-begotten ways, he amassed a fortune, bought the flashiest house on West Egg, then hurled his hundreds on stupendously extravagant parties to lure the lovely Daisy back into his arms, like a moth to an enchanted flame.

Gatsby is one of literature’s most powerful dreamers (hence the “great”), and his passion and longing for Daisy is as gorgeous to behold as the little green light at the end of her dock. But the fact is, having more money than we need to cover the essentials in life (food, clothes, shelter, and, of course, books) causes more problems than it solves. Not only does it fail to bring Gatsby lasting happiness with Daisy, but the making of it causes him to abandon and defile his true self. What does he think he’s doing calling everyone “old sport” in a fake English accent, owning more shirts than he can possibly wear, and holding parties that he doesn’t enjoy? And what does he expect Daisy to do when she discovers how he earned it all? When the flame sputters, and Gatsby goes out, he has no one to blame but himself.

As for being broke, our cure comes in three parts. First, read
Money
by Martin Amis to remind yourself of the horrible ways in which money can taint and corrupt. Then read
Young Hearts Crying
by Richard Yates to see how an inherited fortune can obscure the path to a life of purpose and a sense of self-worth. Finally, return to
The Great Gatsby
and do what James Gatz should have done: inhabit and accept your impoverished self and find someone who loves you as you are. Then quit wasting money on lottery tickets, downsize, and learn to budget. If your job still doesn’t bring in
enough for the basics, get another one. If it does, stop whining and get on with living happily ever after within your modest means.

See also:
Tax return, fear of doing

Utz

BRUCE CHATWIN

T
he percussive smash of china hitting the floor is a dramatic shock of a sound that is always impressive. Unfortunately, the satisfaction it brings doesn’t last long, and is quickly superseded by dismay. Broken china is strangely symbolic of the human heart—one minute so robust and whole, and the next so irreparably damaged. Luckily, unlike a broken heart, broken china can often be glued back together.

But if your broken Davenport sugar bowl, handed down through the generations, is beyond repair, read
Utz
. Kaspar Utz is a Czechoslovakian connoisseur of Meissen porcelain with compulsive collecting habits who becomes a prisoner to his own pieces. Jewish, he risks his life by staying in Russia under Stalin, because he cannot take his priceless artifacts with him. Such is the danger and tyranny of beautiful possessions.

But when Utz dies, having left his collection to the Rudolfine Museum in Prague, his china is nowhere to be found. Various theories are offered as to where his fine china has vanished to, and we will not spoil the ending by giving away the one that proves correct. Suffice it to say, Professor Utz was finally liberated of his obsession. If, through Utz, you can learn to accept the essentially transitory nature of both lives and material possessions, you will be liberated of your upset too.

Requiem for a Dream

HUBERT SELBY, JR.

T
o witness the destruction of a loved one’s dreams—or to resign yourself to the loss of your own—is a terrible thing to go through. And it’s much more common than you’d think. Having a dream is easy, but finding the right way to
make it come true is much harder—and success or failure can make or break you. If you’ve given up on your dreams, ask yourself if you ever really gave them a chance. As this hard-hitting novel shows, it’s possible to choose the wrong way to achieve them.

Everyone has a dream in this novel. Harry and Marion dream of having their own little business, a café with art for sale on the walls, including Marion’s own. Harry’s best friend, Tyrone, simply wants to escape the ghetto. And Sara, Harry’s mother, has hopes for the mystic realms of live television, in the beam of which she spends most of her waking life.

The dreams are innocent enough. It’s the way they go about realizing them that’s the problem. Because the key to escaping their bottom-rung lives in New York, so Harry and Marion believe, is a particularly potent type of heroin they plan to sell at a massive profit. They test the heroin for quality, and before they know it, they’re hooked. Tyrone too. Meanwhile, Sara sits on her couch simultaneously eating chocolate and popping slimming pills, convinced she will make it onto the weight loss show she’s glued to. She never gets there.

Instead of achieving their dreams, each character descends into a living hell. Read this devastating, shocking novel. It’s too late for Harry, Marion, Tyrone, and Sara—but it’s not too late for you. Think of a practical, realistic way to achieve your dreams—one that doesn’t involve the sale of narcotics (see: Drugs, doing too many). Keep your eyes on the dream, but also on each rung of the ladder.

See also:
Disenchantment
•
Hope, loss of

See:
Friend, falling out with your best

As It Is in Heaven

NIALL WILLIAMS

•   •   •

Jane Eyre

CHARLOTTE BRONTË