cover image Death My Own Way

Death My Own Way

Michael S.A. Graziano. Leapfrog (Consortium, dist.), $13.95 trade paper (122p) ISBN 978-1-935248-33-0

Graziano (God Soul Mind Brain), a Princeton professor of neuroscience, writes with intelligence, mischief, pace, and economy, and seems to care little about telling a story. He uses a whiff of outrageous plot—a naked, terminally ill man perches on a wall in Central Park—to bat around the big questions. “What is love? What is art?” he asks playfully, though not frivolously. There is a bit more plot when a helpful woman, mistaking him for a suicide case, falls from his perch to her death. This accident turns blame on the man and the flurry of activity that follows allows him to flee deeper into the park, all the better to join the fun and provocative discussions that constitute the bulk of this book. In a touch of irony, the philosophic circle with whom he discusses not just love and art but also religion and death (he calls them “the committee”), are a ragtag group of homeless people, given names like Chair Lady, Knee, Guitar, and Bottle Rat. The kind of entertaining and piquant talk that you hope to hear in your favorite bar or on cable TV, but almost never do. (Dec.)