I am mostly impressed with Gary Shteyngart’s Super Sad True Love Story. Its reflection on and send-up of our current media-obsessed, gadget-driven culture seems a clear indictment of where we are headed if we continue in this direction, but I feel the author let a few things slip through the cracks. For instance, although Shteyngart addresses the issues of government contracting in its current form, it is highly improbable that a foreign corporation (Staatling-Wapachung Corporation) would ever win the sort of contract with the military he implies. The best example I can think of is the Air Force tanker plane contract, which eventually went to Boeing over McDonald-Douglas because of the latter’s use of an Airbus airframe. Continue reading “Shteyngart’s SSTLS as Commentary on International Relations”