Week 34 Reading (2026) Pip Adam & Philip Metres

Pip Adam’s Audition is surely one of the strangest books I have read. At first, it was compelling because I desperately wanted to know just what the hell was going on. The first 58 pages (in the 2025 U.S. edition from Coffee House Press) are strictly a conversation between three giants—or at least three people who believe they are giant in size. They are the sole occupants of the wing of a large spacecraft headed to an unknown destination. While the setting signals science fiction, the chatter between Alba, Drew, and Stanley make it very clear that their issues—and the author’s—are very earthbound, however mysterious they may be at first. They are dealing with personal memories, some undisclosed form of trauma, and perhaps coerced attendance at a group re-education center. With each chapter and section, the book shape-shifts, as if it were a Transformer. I can’t say more without ruining the pleasure you will have as Adam’s plot unfolds while you read Audition (which I recommend…