Zazen
Zazen (Vanessa Veselka, Red Lemonade 2011, 256 pages)
Vanessa Veselka has shelled out a book worthy of widespread recognition. Original and brilliant, Zazen details the life of Della Mylinak, a post-graduate yoga-practicing misanthropic waitress who navigates through (what I’d like to call) a dystopian existential crisis. When everyone else is leaving the United States — now a war-torn country plagued with daily violence — for safer regions of the world like Honduras, Mexico, and Indonesia, Della opts instead to sign up for yoga classes and take a job at a vegan café. She brushes aside distractions like sex parties and exotic vacations, taking note of the state of her country through dark observations:
“I went into the kitchen and pulled a five-gallon bucket out of the fridge. They stack the tofu in soft blocks at the bottom of a bucket of water. With dirty hands I scooped out the tofu and threw a handful into the blender, little white clay hearts. Then I filled it to the brim with blackberries. I pressed the “chop” on the blender because it’s louder and takes longer and in a second the blackberries stained those little white hearts and turned them dark as a bruise. I left the blender on. It took over the restaurant. Everyone tried harder and harder to ignore the noise but the more they did, the longer I let it run. There should be some price to pay for all of this ugliness, especially the pretty kind; especially the kind you don’t always see.”
At times, it seemed like I was reading some disturbed teenage girl’s diary ranting about human nature, people setting themselves on fire, rallies and protests, and yet Veselka writes a softened grace into Della’s voice as to prevent her narration from coming off too haughty or bitchy. There are a few redeeming lines that shift the pessimistic weight of the content, balancing out the overall tone of the book. An example would be Zazen’s fiercely brilliant closing:
“I looked around at the smoke and people. I couldn’t find any hate in me anywhere. The world is a violent child none of us will get to see grow up. I decided to love it anyway.”
An artful take on self-destruction, the identity crisis, and a modern dystopia, Veselka has crafted one of the most impactful female voices in fiction I’ve yet to come across. Zazen is a leader in the indie lit scene in not only breadth, but style and tone.
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