Is It Really Real, Son?

Sarah is one of my favorite books of all time.  Intensely dark and compelling, with aspects of magical realism, it's a wildly creative novel and a uniquely American story that plays out amongst the isolated and marginalized characters who populate truck stops and constitute their own community along the highway.  The themes are often rather disturbing, but the fairytale-esque details and likeable main character make it a memorable read.

In anticipation of a recent long train ride, I picked up author JT Leroy's collection of interlinked short stories, The Heart is Deceitful Above All Things, and although I liked it, it's less hopeful and magnetic than Sarah.  Extreme neglect and parental abuse combined with religious fundamentalism figure frequently in each of the stories, and the elements of Sarah that made the story loopy and comic, like a teenage hooker transforming herself into a religious icon and a diner that serves impossibly gourmet food, have been stripped away.

I visit JT Leroy's personal website to see if he had any other projects in the works, and was very interested to learn that a film version, featuring Asia Argento as both director and star, of Heart has been produced and will be released soon.  Very cool.