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JPod

By Douglas Coupland

(197)

| Paperback | 9780679314257

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Book Description

A lethal joyride into today’s new breed of technogeeks, Coupland’s forthcoming novel updates Microserfs for the age of Google.

Ethan Jarlewski and five co-workers whose names start with J are bureaucratically marooned in jPod. jPod is a no-escape architectural limbo on the Continue

A lethal joyride into today’s new breed of technogeeks, Coupland’s forthcoming novel updates Microserfs for the age of Google.

Ethan Jarlewski and five co-workers whose names start with J are bureaucratically marooned in jPod. jPod is a no-escape architectural limbo on the fringes of a massive Vancouver game design company.

The six workers daily confront the forces that define our era: global piracy, boneheaded marketing staff, people smuggling, the rise of China, marijuana grow ops, Jeff Probst, and the ashes of the 1990s financial tech dream. jPod’s universe is amoral and shameless. The characters are products of their era even as they’re creating it.

Everybody in Ethan’s life inhabits a moral grey zone. Nobody is exempt, not even his seemingly straitlaced parents or Coupland himself, as readers will see.

Full of word games, visual jokes and sideways jabs, this book throws a sharp, pointed lawn dart into the heart of contemporary life. jPod is Douglas Coupland at the top of his game.

Excerpt from jPod:

I slunk into the BoardX meeting where Steve, Gord-O, and staff from the loftiest perches of the food chain were still trying to nail the essence of Jeff the Charismatic Turtle. Prototype turtle sketches were pinned onto a massive cork wall, all of them goofy and teensploitational: sunglasses, baggy pants and (dear God) a terry-cloth sweatband.

“Does Jeff the Turtle follow players around the entire time they manipulate their third person?”

“Almost. Like Watson is to Sherlock Holmes.”

“Can you imagine how annoying that would be?”

“Maybe the buddy isn’t such a good idea.”

Steve squashed that hope. “It’s going to be a buddy. Players will love it.”

“It’s really Poochie-Joins-Itchy-and-Scratchy.”

“How am I ever going to look somebody who plays Tony Hawk games in the face again?”

“Isn’t our turtle supposed to be a bit more studly?”

“Turtles aren’t studly by nature.”

“What about the turtle they used in the 1950s to pimp the atomic weapons program? He was kind of studly.”

“No he wasn’t and, besides, he’s dead.”

“What?”

“Dead. Hanged himself from the side of his posh midtown Manhattan terrarium. Left a note saying he couldn’t handle the shame of what he’d done. Wrote it on a piece of Bibb lettuce.”


From the Hardcover edition.

Critics

  • When Ronald McDonald did dirty deeds

    JPod by Douglas Coupland Bloomsbury £12.99, pp449 Douglas Coupland is neither a master of plot, nor of characterisation. However, when on form, he is possibly the most gifted exegete of North American mass culture writing today. Since his remarkable ... (read full critics)

    guardian.co.uk published on Sat, 25 Sep 2010

  • Spam and pi

    JPod by Douglas Coupland (Bloomsbury, £7.99) Since the publication of his cult classic, Microserfs, Douglas Coupland has attempted to do for computer geeks what Dickens did for poor clerks and scriveners. His current novel is swollen to truly Dickens ... (read full critics)

    guardian.co.uk published on Sat, 25 Sep 2010

7 Reviews

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  • 3 people find this helpful

    It has a few funnies here and there, but this book tries sooo hard to be clever and quirky.

    Very disappointing.

    Is this helpful?

    Halfadrop said on Feb 24, 2008 | Add your feedback

  • 1 person find this helpful

    Oh how I laughed! Loved it!
    The story centers around a video game development employee, Ethan, and his co-workers. The book is pretty random, and the plot slightly ridiculous but if you treat this book lightly and try not to try to find meaning in it, it's alot of fun! I recommend it, I mean ... (continue)

    Oh how I laughed! Loved it!
    The story centers around a video game development employee, Ethan, and his co-workers. The book is pretty random, and the plot slightly ridiculous but if you treat this book lightly and try not to try to find meaning in it, it's alot of fun! I recommend it, I mean, come one! A edible stapler? LOL

    Is this helpful?

    YAappreciation said on Aug 5, 2007 | Add your feedback

  • 1 person find this helpful

    I kept reading this because it was a gift, and because it was hyped up to be such a great book, but like any lame joke it kept building up and getting sillier and sillier, and the punchline never came.

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    Timja said on Jul 16, 2007 | Add your feedback

  • The first real picture of a working environment I had ever read!!!
    Silly, unconventional, crazy, hilarious, sarcastic EXCELLENT. Thanx 2 KIA

    Is this helpful?

    Marco said on Aug 30, 2009 about the Hardcover edition | Add your feedback

  • When "Microserfs" hit, I was enthralled. It said a lot about my life: popular culture as I was a sprawling 20-something working with computers? C'est moi; second helping, please. Today, "jPod". I'm still in the same line of work, still surrounded by wonderful autists and Coupland sniffs most of the ... (continue)

    When "Microserfs" hit, I was enthralled. It said a lot about my life: popular culture as I was a sprawling 20-something working with computers? C'est moi; second helping, please. Today, "jPod". I'm still in the same line of work, still surrounded by wonderful autists and Coupland sniffs most of the air out off that atmosphere.

    The twists and turns of the book are otherworldly, even Monty Pythonesque, and I shan't give any away. Wikipedia will give you the plot. I'll just say that I think Coupland's existential ponderings are interesting kicks and that I loved some of the characters; Ethan's mom scared me the most, by far.

    Some things in the book are very Coupland, e.g. dressing a lot of illegal refugees in nerd, e.g. a Nine Inch Nails Fragility 2.0 tour t-shirt. Pop culture-references hail while the plot thickens, loosens up and gives way to a sort of Bill Hicks-ish atmosphere, circa "it's just a ride".

    Is this helpful?

    Niklas Pivic said on Dec 12, 2008 about the Hardcover edition | Add your feedback

  • Anyone who's every worked long hours in a cube farm can relate to this book in a "how-is-this-my-life" sort of way.

    Is this helpful?

    Cmmosher said on Apr 2, 2008 about the Hardcover edition | Add your feedback

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