by Jeff Cann
Losman and I are identical. I often felt like I was reading about myself. So much so that by page seventy-five, I was so agitated I almost stopped reading altogether.
This is an excerpt from an email I sent to Kyle Semmel the other day. He’s the author of the book I just finished. Right now, regular readers of my book reviews will palm their faces and think, “Oh, Jeff, you promised to stop emailing authors after the Sarah Penner debacle.
Settle down; Kyle emailed me first. My brother introduced us via email. Semmel wrote an essay about his Tourette Syndrome. My brother thought it might interest me. That was months ago. We’ve exchanged a few emails since then. He let me know when his book was released. Weeks later, he notified me that he had linked one of my articles on X. In that email, he asked if I read The Book of Losman yet.
I replied: I haven’t gotten it. I pre-read a chapter on Amazon and found that it badly triggered my tics. Tourette is a strange disorder. Doctors and researchers can’t explain the biology of what’s going on in our brains. There isn’t a whole lot of rhyme or reason why our tics—our unwanted movements and vocalizations—become more pervasive at times. Stress is involved. For me, caffeine is too, but the power of suggestion never fails. If I think about tics, I tic. If I read about them, well, all hell breaks loose.
After reading that chapter on Amazon, I turned to my wife, Susan, and said, “I don’t think I’m going to be able to read this book.” But then, my loyalty to another author with Tourette, a friend of my brother’s no less, got to me. I owed it to him to read his book. And I’m happy to report I loved it. Here’s a blurb from Semmel’s website:
Meet Daniel Losman—an American in Copenhagen, translating books and living a solitary existence. His longtime girlfriend has left him, and the only highlights in his life are encounters with an offbeat artist he thinks he’s in love with and weekends with his three-year-old son, whom he worries has inherited his Tourette Syndrome.
When Losman learns of a new drug designed to locate the root of his Tourette’s through childhood memories, he’s lured by promises of a cure and visits the mysterious lab that developed the drug. Initially, what he discovers buried deep within his brain rejuvenates him. But the more Losman takes the drug, the more he needs it. Losman steals some of the pills and locks himself away in his apartment, only to quickly find himself trapped inside his own mind. There’s a way out of his head, but it will come at a price…
So, Tourette Syndrome and sci-fi. When Semmel conceived this story, he should have written in his notebook, “Target audience? Jeff Cann!” These two topics draw me in like no other. Losman’s tics mirror my own. Neither of us has coprolalia, involuntary outbursts of obscene words and inappropriate remarks that most people mistakenly assume all with Tourette’s display, but we both grunt, clamp our eyelids shut, and jut out our bottom lip to blow air across our faces. We also both dwell in the self-disgust of the disorder.
Other ways Losman and I are similar: We long for a magic bullet to cure our Tourette; we harbor self-fulfilling prophesies that Tourette torpedoes our relationships; we’re hypervigilant of our offspring, constantly searching for inherited Tourette symptoms; and our significant others—his ex, my wife—admonish us for surrendering too much importance and power to Tourette Syndrome. To quote Susan, “Yes, you have Tourette, you can’t change it, you just have to accept it.”
I told Semmel that Losman’s life seemed to be taken from my own experiences. I told him this was easily the best novel I’ve read about how Tourette can impact all facets of someone’s life. I even asked Susan to read those brutal seventy-five first pages to gain a better understanding of what goes on in my brain.
So, what did I think of the book as a whole? I’m going to give it 4.5 stars. Five stars for the accurate portrayal of Tourette Syndrome in an adult, especially Losman’s awkward budding relationship with his neighbor. I’ll give the ambitious and wholly original science fiction plot four stars. This aspect of the book isn’t perfect, but I found it inventive and, at times, disturbing, and it kept me plowing through the book to see how things turned out.
About ten percent of the articles and essays I’ve written, maybe seventy or eighty thousand words, are dedicated to Tourette’s awareness. If I took all those articles, those anecdotes, those thoughts and emotions, and distilled them down into one fictional character, I’d be left with Losman. If you’re remotely interested in understanding the Tourette experience, read this book. Or, if you want to read a cool sci-fi story that takes place in Copenhagen (an interesting city I’ve never once previously considered), and you couldn’t care less about Tourette Syndrome, read the book anyway. My guess is you’ll find both plots in The Book of Losman interesting, educational, and entertaining.
The Book of Losman by K.E. Semmel is one of over 121,000 books you can find on the shelves of the Adams County Library System. These books touch on every imaginable topic. Drop in and explore today.
Jeff Cann is the Finance Director of the Adams County Library System.
I will read the book. I was the CEO of the Tourette’s Syndrome Foundation many years ago.