David Keenan joins serious fabulists and metaphormen Kundera, Coover & Co. with this perverse and metafictional novel. We follow the rise and falling-out of a pseudonymous musician, Xstabeth, with critical “essays” about the “deceased author” and the novel we’re reading in between. Herein: experimentation that succeeds.
Xstabeth by David Keenan, (List Price: $20, Europa Editions, 9781609457341, February 2022)
Reviewed by Conor Hultman, Square Books in Oxford, Mississippi