Modelland by Tyra Banks
My rating: 1 of 5 stars
01/13/2016 Update:
Okay, there are a few storylines that I THINK are coming to actually mean something. Now, 44% into the book, I think I have a handle on a few developing pieces of action that we probably need to outline for the rest of this to kind of, sort of make sense.
Think of this book as a smoothie made out of a bunch of insane shit. You came home, Hannibal Lecter is there with an alien, a avant garde French chef, and a space alien. They’ve teamed up to create a smoothie in your kitchen. You see some ingredients laying around the kitchen, but you don’t know what all ended up in the final product. However, you look at the glass of beige (it’d probably be beige, right? Like hummus color? The weirdest color for food besides pitch black?) and you can see in there a piece of carrot, a human ear, and there’s a piece of celery sticking out of the whole thing as garnish. The celery has been placed in the exact center of the glass, and the thickness of the smoothie is holding it straight upright. But it’s definitely celery, carrot and ear in there amongst other ingredients.
This book is a smoothie full of a bunch of shit, but I think I’ve identified 3 ingredients that will probably come up later, so we need to get them out of the way here.
But that sounds boring. Just rehash of plot. How might we liven this up?
A few weeks back I signed up for the beta of something called Wordseye. This is a software that allows you to set a scene with text, write out a description of a scene, and the words are interpreted into images that appear on screen. Which could be pretty cool and useful for something like creating a scene in a novel. Or you could just do shit like, I don’t know, have a baby on a ping pong table with a sandwich.
It doesn’t work too well with verbs, and some of the stuff doesn’t translate well. Plus, I suck at using it so far. But interspersed throughout the things I’m typing here, I thought it’d be nice to include some images I made in Wordseye, using text from this chapter of Modelland.
Storyline 1: Zarpessa, Tookie’s Enemy, Is Secretly Poor
Earlier in the book Tookie somehow spied Zarpessa dumpster diving or something. It turns out that Zarpessa is poor, or we’re supposed to think that, but it’s a big secret. Not only is it a secret that she’s poor, but Zarpessa seems to insist on rubbing in everyone’s face the lie that she’s rich. Somehow, Zarpessa KNOWS that Tookie KNOWS this secret, and she threatens her with empty nonsense so that Tookie won’t tell, even though it doesn’t seem to matter one bit in Modelland if you have cash.
I’m not sure where this is going. Zarpessa is being a total, unmitigated dickhole so far, but maybe the pair will find friendship? Maybe a tearful, “I was only mean because I was afraid” kind of thing? Maybe Zarpessa will remain mean throughout, something I wouldn’t predict in a normal book because why then would we show her as poor? However, Modelland has surprised me in stupider ways. That should be a motto for this book. Just when you thought a surprise couldn’t be more stupider, it gets a whole lot much more stupider.
Storyline 2: Tookie and Some Candidates Aren’t Supposed to Be In Modelland
It has been suggested, with a hand heavy as Steve Avery’s father’s hand (take a look. Kielbasa fingers all day) that Tookie and the other candidates she arrived with are misfits who don’t actually belong in Modelland. This is confusing because, fuck, the whole structure of this thing is confusing, but it seems like this storyline is going to play a part somehow.
I don’t know when this is going to be revealed to be true or not true, or if this is another Wonka-ing, making Tookie THINK that she’s unfit to be a model when really, the true test of character is blahblahblah. I don’t know much about this other than to say it’s happening, so it’ll probably come up sooner or later.
Storyline 3: Ci~L (the 7Seven from the past who also was the scout that picked up Tookie & Co.) is A Bad Rebel
We’ve seen Ci~L (possibly the most annoying name I’ve ever typed as a tilde doesn’t have a fucking sound associated with it, is therefore rarely used, and is not meant to be used as a fancy dash. In fact, I looked into this a little more, and the only language where the tilde appears without being above, below, next to, or in place of a letter it’s modifying is Guarani. In which case it’s a velar nasal consonant, which is the -ng at the end of “sing.” Meaning this name is perhaps pronounce “See-ng-ell”) beating herself with a paddle, we’ve seen her dressed down by most of the Modelland staff, and it would seem that she disappeared for a time.
Ci~L is also the one who brought Tookie and her crew to Modelland, so it would follow that Ci~L is pulling some bullshit by bringing a bunch of losers to Modelland. Or that she’s so far ahead of the others that she knows this is a good move. I don’t know. It’s impossible to say with this book.
What we know, without being really told what happened, is that Ci~L is in deep shit for some reason. But what it means to be in deep shit in Modelland is pretty unclear. They basically abuse the hell out of everyone anyway, so I’m not sure how different it is. It’s like being in the POW camp from First Blood Part 2, but instead of hooking you up to a car battery, they use a MARINE battery, which we all know has more lasting power. We all know that, right? From watching those disaster prep shows?
These seem to be the main plotlines of the book at this point. That and “Modelland be crazy.” If that can be generously called a plot point, then there you go.
We are currently 44% through the book. So I have to say, I’m a little nervous. I don’t think, knowing what I know now, that the dramatic tension of these three points can be maintained by Tyra for another 56% of this brick. There could be twists and turns, but I have a feeling it’ll be more like twists and burns.
Look how clever my writing has gotten thanks to this book. You take a word, but then instead of the word, you write a DIFFERENT word that RHYMES with that word.
Suck, F. Scott Fitzlame-eld.
Take that, HemingWRONGway.
How do you like me now, James NoJoyce?