Review of Joe's Liver by Paul Di Filippo

That thimbleful of readers who regularly visit Speculiction know that it prefers the strong undercurrents of fiction, undercurrents that go largely unnoticed by the mainstream yet are more original, more sophisticated than what flows on the surface. Paul Di Filippo is a fish who swims in these waters. Impossible to pin down to a particular current, however, Joe's Liver (2000) is yet another book that can't be summed up in a word or two. (Presciently thigh-slapping? Naww, no justice there...)

Joe's Liver is the story of a guy named Reader's Digest from a fictional Caribbean island nation (that really likes nutmeg). Yes, his name is Reader's Digest, a name given him by his mother, a woman who loved the American periodical, and who instilled a similar love in her son. (Don't worry, he quickly becomes Ardy in the story, i.e his initials.) She instilled the love to the point Ardy has made the decision to travel to the US to visit Reader's Digest HQ. Trouble is, he doesn't have a visa to enter the country. The novel thus opens with Ardy making a border run from the Canadian side, a run that quickly spins out of control. Ardy's path to his goal waylaid, the obstacle course of American culture awaits.

Joe's Liver is comedy gold with light commentary on American culture. Ardy has the personality of Data from Star Trek, which makes for an amusing counter-point to the rednecks, students, aristocrats, religious zealots, and other manner of Americans he meets. An innocent abroad, Di Filippo takes full advantage of Ardy's naivete flying in the bald face of American culture, presenting it in all its absurd glory. (Eddie Murphy's Coming to America is a not-so-distant relative.) Nuclear reactor detonations, violent student protests, radical Christian caravans, underground nationalist gatherings, shopping sprees, affairs with Boston blue bloods—this is just a sampling of the wild situations Ardy finds himself in on the road to Reader's Digest HQ.

It took me a while to try to find why the novel is titled as it is. But imdb seems to offer a clue. I Am Joe's Liver is apparently the title of a short 1980's medical video about, you guessed it, a guy named Joe and his liver. Part of a series, the liver is just one of the organs featured. In the brief films, a man voices over the daily life of a flashy guy, showing how his bad habits influence his body.  There are pauses for what were snappy medical graphics and diagrams. (“Joe's Heart” can be found here.) Accordingly, Di Filippo would seem to be riffing off the juxtaposition of America as seen from the flashy outside vs the realities of bad habits inside. To be clear here, Di Filippo is not taking the piss out of the US. There are subtle appreciations that temper the indirect criticisms. Joe Liver's is not even close to the in-your-face "politics" of novels these days.

Joe's Liver is an extremely odd novel to categorize. Certainly humor, it uses a country-bumpkin-in-the-big-nutmeg-city vibe to get clever laughs.  For the concerned, Di Filippo does not resort to cheap sex and toilet jokes despite the American setting. Going a level deeper, it occupies satire territory; Di Filippo plays off American stereotypes to build a more realistic picture of the country's reality. Ardy's experiences of the USA through Reader's Digest is entirely different than his boots-on-the-ground life. And then there's just the sheer joy of writing that Di Filippo brings to the page. Reveling in the English language, the book can be a real treat for people who enjoy seeing our language stretched and exercised in playful, canny fashion as regardless what a person thinks of the story, the telling is at least a joy.