Modelland by Tyra Banks
My rating: 1 of 5 stars
01/25/2016 Update:
Do you feel like it’s been too long since this book had just a whole pile of crazy shit on the page? Like Tyra held a crazy pistol to her head and blew her crazy brain out all over the manuscript, and now we’re just reading ALL the crazy shit that can fit into vaguely-English words?
Good news. Welcome to the Fashion Emergency Department Store, specifically, The Drama Trauma Center.
You might remember that Tookie got scratched up by some cat women, which is why we need to make a trip to the DTC.
Now, for the first time, half way through the book, Tookie lets us know that her mother took her to a bunch of unnecessary medical appointments to find out why her forehead was big, and why she could eat without gaining weight. I like that, subjecting someone to hospital visits because they have a trait you’re pissed off about. “This guy’s handsome. Tell me what to do to fix it.”
And why do shitty books and movies think not liking the hospital is a character trait? And why do the characters have to provide a dumb reason they don’t like the hospital? The hospital sucks. Feel free to let me know when a character is totally into the hospital, or at least doesn’t mind it. The default is hating the hospital. You might as well develop a character by saying, “Our plucky protagonist is a living human female who prefers a mix of oxygen and nitrogen for breathing, would rather not have her fingers cut off than have her fingers cut off, and don’t turn away now, there’s more! Read on!”
We enter the whatever it’s called, and we meet Purse Drestookill.
Quote: “At Modelland, I guess nurses are called purses.”
Gah! Gahd Damnit! Yeah, I fucking guess so. I guess nurses are called purses, a commons is called an uncommons, and a person is named Ci~L in Modelland.
I just, I want to express my anger that this is the FIRST FUCKING TIME Tookie is like, “Gee, things sure have weird names here, huh?” And it’s for a nurse called purse. A one-letter swap that, granted, has NO purpose whatsoever, but this is like the one-billionth stupidly named fucking thing in this book, and for whatever reason, it’s the one that trips Tookie’s trigger.
You know what? Fine. Whatever.
We have to move on because Purse(! FUCK! SHIT!) Drestookill (ALSO FUCK SHIT! and hang on, one S, TWO O’s, the complete opposite of what it should be FUCKHELLFUCK) is also made out of knives. Yes, she has blades all over her body, and a pair of scissors is what the top of her head is made of.
And then we get the doctor, who has rollerskates for feet. Why? Oh, it’s Modelland, there’s a perfectly-good explanation:
“All doctors here at Modelland have them…[Modelland] was a blessing for my kind, because the powers that be at Modelland recognized that skates for feet would be put to good use in emergency medical situations…they figured we could get from one patient to the next with speed and ease. So they trained us all and…here I am. They take good care of us…My daughter, Camina Marche, she’s about your age. She’s just like her mama. Got roller skates for feet too. She wouldn’t have a chance in life without this place. She’s in medical school right now.”
Wait, there’s more:
“Modelland isn’t just what you see when you go from class to class. There is a whole underground world here. Parts of it are still a mystery to even me, and I was born here.”
Okay, recap.
Freaks born with rollerskate feet and knife heads are taken in by Modelland to be doctors and whatnot, and they live underground in Modelland.
In a competent book, I would be 100% sure this was important information. I would be sure, based on this revelation, that the underground part of Modelland, this working class, would play a big part in the story at some point.
In this book, I just don’t know. I have no fucking idea.
Take my beloved Demolition Man. There’s an underground society in that movie, and they waste no time showing its existence. They allude to it, not subtly, like 3 times before the movie actually goes and checks it out. The viewer is going, “Huh, I wonder what’s going on in this underground city” as opposed to, “Wait, what? There’s an underground city of rollerskate weirdos?”
Modelland has had exactly ZERO mentions of an underground, let alone some kind of behind-the-scenes staff thus far. Wha, guh, would’t you at least mention this somehow? Make me think SOMETHING is going on?
Oh, wait. Can we take a break? It’s time for a PSA:
Doctor Erika: I’m a doctor, not a purse.
Zarpessa: Of course! I’m sorry Doctor, of course, Doctor. But you only handle the small stuff, right? Like knitting up cut knees and putting patches on bumps and scrapes. The big stuff is for a man’s mind. Open-heart surgery, brain trauma, that kind of thing.
Doctor Erika: It sounds like brain trauma might be something I should check YOU for.
I read it, stood up from my seat at Starbucks, and clapped. Well done. Finally, striking a blow for all the women doctors out there being berated by 14 year-old dumpster divers. It’s about time we took them down a peg. And hey, maybe this message will make a little girl think, I could be a doctor. I mean, probably not, I would hope that no doctor I ever see has read this book because I’m afraid it’s like LSD and parts of it are stored in your body, waiting to flash you back to some crazy shit.
Anyway, the fucking ER is like the place where Willy Wonka’s victims would go. There’s a girl who has Boy Withdrawal, there are two girls who are turning into horses and diagnosed with “Clothes Horse”, and Tookie get a little time with the doctor, where the doc explains why names are so important:
“Oh, and I know you heard me talking about how children grow up a certain way depending on what their parents name them. Dig deep to see if your name is something to follow or fight against. Tookie. The last syllable sounds like key. Maybe you’re searching for something, and you have the power to unlock it or set it free.”
That’s, wow. That’s like the classic Mo’Nique quote, “If you take the T off of diet, you know what that spells? Die. Which means you need that good food.”
Right. Sort of like how if you take the E off of DIME, it spells DIM, which is because if you only have a dime, your chances of success are dim. Or if you listen to the first part of my name, PEE, that makes sense because I pee sometimes.
Isn’t it amazing how words are made out of other words? There’s a real ENG400 class in this Modelland, I tell you what.
Tookie is given some Zed Meds, which have a Zed effect, which means that she starts her words with Z’s. And of course, how embarrassing, this is one the love of Tookie’s (last couple days of) life, Bravo, enters the scene…