How to use this Page

Losing Michael Malone by Nicholas Kasunic

Reviewed by: Chris Singer

About the author:

At 20 years old, Nicholas Kasunic is finding his voice as a writer.  A native of Pittsburgh, PA, he attends the University of Pittsburgh.  Still a ways from a degree, he does claim expertise in pain as a result of his medical condition of CRPS (Complex Regional Pain Syndrome).  In lieu of succumbing to a dark and empty life, he uses his personal agony as a catalyst for his writing.  Full of insight into both the positive and negative aspects of struggle, his work covers a spectrum of emotional responses to life.

In his first novel, Losing Michael Malone, Kasunic studies the subtle emotions of pain and all its friends–depression, disease, passion, love, guilt, self-loathing, disappointment –while chronicling five characters in their desperate search for meaning.  Hitting bookstores March 1, 2011.

About the book:

In Losing Michael Malone, five characters search for happiness in a time of suffering.  Emma is blind to the sunshine that gleams around her each and every day. Maddie witnesses a drained and exhausted marriage. Jack is without solitude in a life of inner conflict and self-loathing. Love and compassion rip and tear through the life of Kathryn. Michael hurts too much to feel anything.

Through all of the pain of passion and disease, this cast of characters is on a collision course towards each other—no matter how much they’d like to run away. It all contributes to the narrative of what we refer to as life. Nothing keeps us from it, and everything tries to take it away.

My take on the book:

On Nicholas Kasunic’s website, he lists the book Notes From Underground by Fyodor Dostoevsky in his bio. He doesn’t mention whether it’s a favorite book of his or not, but after reading Losing Michael Malone I have no doubt Dostoevsky has had a big influence on the author.

From what little I know of Kasunic and after having read his book, I can see the connection between both authors. Losing Michael Malone is an autobiographical novel exploring the psychology of pain and suffering, both physical and emotional. In a series of vignettes, we meet five characters, all connected to Michael Malone. With Michael being the connecting thread, we see each of the characters searching for a way out from underneath the burdens of their own personal pain and suffering.

Like Michael Malone, Nicholas Kasunic suffers daily from chronic pain. Nobody in literary history has ever written about pain like Dostoevsky writes about pain, and Kasunic, to his credit, does superbly in his own effort. As each character expresses their own stories of what pain and suffering is to them, Kasunic’s prose

I found this cool meme today and wanted to participate. Here’s how it works:

How to participate: Share the first line (or two) of the book you are currently reading on your blog or in the comments. Include the title and the author so we know what you’re reading. Then, if you feel so moved, let us know what your first impressions were based on that first line, and let us know if you liked or did not like the sentence. The link-up will be over at A Few More Pages every Friday.

This first line is from a book I will be reviewing next week. It’s called Losing Michael Malone and it’s a work of fiction written by 20-year-old author, Nicholas Kasunic.

“The viewing was today — a day, in description, no different than the next.”

Please stop by next week and you’ll get all my thoughts and impressions of this book.