Permutation City Blog

A story told through a sequence of letter, journal, and story extracts. It centres around the humdrum life of workers in a Staples store. They're each trying to find their way through life and the possibility of some meaning. It has a familiar feeling of Coupland's work. It is sort-of self-referential which walks a fine line between being clever and self-intulgent, sometimes falling off towards the later.

If you think of a modern version of MicroSerfs then you'll have the right idea. Just don't expect it to enjoy it as much. I was warned that Douglas Coupland appears in this book as a character. The character himself was annoying but I think the self-referential nature made it extra annoying, I'm not sure why. There were a lot of characters I didn't like and payoff for me at the end to make it worth while. Thank goodness the book only cost a couple of quid.