Negative Space

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B.R:I think you’re pretty close. Out of the three narrators, she has the most distance from Tyler and the phenomena he’s wrapped up in, so her perspective is the closest we have to an objective account (which still is still far from objective—every narrator is unreliable). I think the crucial part is that she, unlike Ahmir or Jill, isn’t chasing after Tyler’s affection, which provides her with a unique perspective, one that may be akin to a narrator or historian. In my mind, your first novel, Amygdalatropolis, is a cult classic. That’s how I feel people are responding to it. It’s cool to see how far it’s gone, because it’s such an indie book. It relays the experience of fringe and transgressive board culture. Over the last, I would say, decade, board culture has slowly made its way into mainstream language. 4chan is, to some degree, a household name. Amygdalatropolis plays with form and mental space relating to living on the net in a way I hadn’t really seen before in books. What was it about this specific project that inspired you to commit to it? Authors, if you are a member of the Goodreads Author Program, you can edit information about your own books. Find out how in this guide.

It was different for each three. Amygdalatropolis, the structure emerged really naturally. With Negative Space I knew from the beginning that was going to be those three rotating narratives and they had to be first person. Then, with Pearl Death, that felt very free. I was working on that on the side and I didn’t have to worry too much about a lot of formal aspects because the form felt very intentional from the very beginning. There wasn’t really any room or any need to deviate from the structure as it was already apparent. Yet what makes Negative Space truly unique is Yeager’s unsentimental and refreshingly modern treatment of queerness and gender identity, which is seamlessly folded into the narrative without devolving into patronising tokenism. Yeager’s depiction of Lu, an alienated trans-woman living under the conservative rule of her parents, attests to this, in that she never outwardly declares or dramatically explains her gender identity to the reader. Rather, her identity is inferred only through the dissonances between the three separate narrators. Ahmir, as well as other peripheral characters, call her ‘Lou’ and refer to her in masculine pronouns; while Lu calls herself ‘Lu’ and uses feminine pronouns, which Jill also employs. Indeed, this device is utilised so subtly that it wasn’t until I was mid-way through the book that I made the connection, which surprised me without obstructing the narrative flow or feeling like a blatantly artificial construction. Lu’s queerness, in other words, feels both natural and unforced within the confines of the story, which is a testament to Yeager’s skill as a writer. Negative Space tells the story of three teenagers living in the fictional town of Kinsfield, New Hampshire: Jill, Lu and Ahmir. Something is happening and it might very well be the end of the world: their classmates are killing themselves, animals hurl themselves at cars on the highway, acts of random violence go barely noticed, their common friend Tyler might be communicating with higher beings. All our three narrators want is to survive whatever’s coming for them. B.R Yeager’s Virus of Life

Fact

I don't think I will be sleeping soundly tonight. Make way for the new generation - B.R. Yeager is at the frontlines, and hopefully, if I can muster the talent and courage to make my voice and the voice of the people with less privilege and similar anxieties to me heard, I'll be right there with him. I wasn’t there but I can see it in my mind. I know what it was like. I know it like a dream. In that way, it’s still happening, and always will be.” Echoing, contradicting prose like this haunts every crevice of B.R. Yeager’s 2020 horror novel Negative Space. Published on March 1st, 2020, the epidemic of teen suicides in the small fictional town of Kinsfield, New Hampshire directly mirrors the pandemic in which the real world would soon find itself. Negative Space blurs the lines between different realities and timelines. Through the daze of a new illicit hallucinogen, cryptic 4chan posts, and the general musings of chronically online teenagers, memories transcend the traditional boundaries of bodies to a shared identity amongst the residents of Kinsfield, NH.

And I loooooved the LGBT representation. LGBT characters exist, and aren't defined by their queerness. It's not even brought up. They're just allowed to exist, and it's wonderful.Ben:I hear you. Tell me about Lu's character. It's one of the parts in Negative SpaceI'm not sure I actually understood. At some point I was convinced he/she was the narrator telling the overall story. At some other, I doubted myself. Were there ideas your were trying to get across through him/her? Ben:Did you intend to write a horror novel with this book? Do you think if yourself as a horror writer? Because from my point of view, it kind of stumbled upon the genre if that makes sense. I see this book mentioned often on this sub and there’s a lot of praise for it so I put it on my reading list because people often cited it as being a mashup of junji Ito and Lovecraft. After reading it all I could feel was... nothing? The characters are all the same and all super annoying. There was no point to the multiple POVs because they weren't differentiated at all. No character development or growth. Tyler is literally the worst throughout the whole book and never gets better. I didn't feel bad for any of them.

It’s difficult to imagine writing a concise plot summary for this book. Because, though it is plenty plot-heavy, I feel like trying to describe it would do a disservice to what I think may be one of the most emotionally evocative novels I’ve read in the past year.Goodreads Librarians are volunteers who help ensure the accuracy of information about books and authors in the Goodreads' catalog. The Goodreads Libra Goodreads Librarians are volunteers who help ensure the accuracy of information about books and authors in the Goodreads' catalog. The Goodreads Librarians Group is the official group for requesting additions or updates to the catalog, including: Wish I could give this one more than 5 stars. Not just my favorite thing I've read this year, but probably one of my favorite things I've read ever? As soon as I finished it I wanted to reset my progress and start all over?? I never feel that way. B.R:Probably not—that would likely take me further away from the writing I want to do. Also, most contractual work seems to be in the realm of criticism and essay, which aren’t my strong points. I understand why full-time writing appeals to some people, and they get into it because they enjoy and excel at those formats. That’s just not the case for me. To delve into the abyss of those suicides and their connection to weight of the soul experiment, Yeager performs vivisection of the way we communicate and build myth of ourselves at school, with friends, and online. He easily achieves it by setting up a standard horror YA novel, a Twin Peaks and Euphoria lovechild if you will, only to pump it full of drugs and then let it, and us, face the world as it is. He doesn’t let you blink until he’s done.