First Jennifer Weiner lead the Franzenfreude movement. Then Emperor Franzen charged in with his twitter satire feeds. It seems that everyone wants to take a stab at the latest author to be inducted into Oprah’s book club, Jonathan Franzen. Novelist Tao Lin is the latest perpetrator to do so by parodying Franzen’s Time magazine cover with a matching cover for the Stranger.
The Stranger reports: “Lin isn’t the richest or most famous living American human, but you could argue-I would argue-that he is one of the most nonjudgmental (for years he has repeatedly stated, ‘There is no good or bad in art’ and ‘Everyone’s actions and beliefs are based on equally arbitrary assumptions’) and also one of the best. His first novel, Eeeee Eee Eeee, about an alienated Domino’s Pizza employee who navigates a secret underground colony of suicidal dolphins and depressed bears, was arguably the literary phenomenon of the ‘fiction reviews’ section of Bookslut.com’s May 2007 issue. His second novel, Richard Yates, arrives this month; like his first novel, it has a richly weird title, crafted with his signature blend of austere eccentricity and powerful atonality.”
Lin holds an undergraduate degree in journalism from New York University. In 2008, he established the publishing house Muumuu Press. Besides his two novels, Lin has also published two volumes of poetry and a novella entitled Shoplifting from American Apparel. Ironically, the novella was sold in the stores of clothing retailer, Urban Outfitters.