by Aaron Worley
No Forwarding Address
by Natalie Jacobson
2.13.61 Press
$11.00 ISBN# 1-880985-46-2
There's something mythic about the young and hopeless in the world. Irving Welsh talked about them living in Edinburgh in Trainspotting, and Natalie Jacobson shows them in New York. The main characters in her book are Doyle and Val, two aging female teenagers who fill their time at punk shows and angel dust parties in the park. Most of their surface worries revolve around figuring out which dive to live in next, which guy to hit on, or what drug to take.
What puts this book above some other street youth stories is that Jacobson takes the time to show that these kids know exactly what they're doing. They know all about the working class, making money, and what society expects from them, but they look at it all with contempt. While everyone else is concerned with moving up, this underground crowd just thinks about moving.
The story starts out with a lot of society bashing but then settles into a story which is full of action and ultimately goes no where. Of course, I mean that in a good way. It's nice to read about female characters with some bite and soul to them, even though they will ultimately lose in life. It reminds us that even those with nowhere to go are trying like hell to fill their lives with something even if that something doesn't do anything to help them out in the long run.
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