Weekend in Silverlake : A Pastoral Comedy

Friday, the sixth of October, 1995 -- the Factory's work week ended when Virgil Ukocho sent his staff of four out into the neighborhood of Silverlake on a simple errand.With each passing hour, the four and their increasingly ramified network of academics, AIDS widowers, artfags, chumps, freeloaders, illegals and zeitgeist-mongers attended parties, broke things, grieved, grumbled in journals, reformed, left false phone messages, promised money that didn't exist and generally perpetuated the existence found in the glow of the neon rats of the Western Exterminator billboard.

By Sunday night Mr. Ukocho's own plans changed, completely upsetting everything for everyone, this time for good.Weekend in Silverlake's themes are the oldest of English fiction -- love and money.

But the fustian of art is refused in favor of something at once more heartfelt, ironic, sophisticated and naive in the tradition of the Satyricon, A Sentimental Journey or The Andy Warhol Diaries.

Kevin McMahon's astonishing novel surveys affection, confidence, irresponsibility, stolen pleasures, remediless death, unpaid debts, the smell of barbecue and the faint buzz of paper horns to provide an answer to the question On top of all our misfortunes must we also be ridiculous?