ABSTRACT
Douglas Coupland's new book is both more than a novel and less. According to the usual trajectory, Coupland's characters are released from their commodified perceptions into feelings that count as 'real': love and/or untrammelled awareness of the natural world. His two Souvenir of Canada volumes give many reasons for thinking of JPod as a book about Vancouver. JPod replays many of Coupland's signature themes, but lacks any spiritual modulation. Within its covers there are pages of pseudo-factual material cut and pasted from the textual world outside: labels for noodle soup and Doritos, advertising copy for the Subway sandwich franchise, and spam emails offering penis enlargements and fat sums of money from Nigeria. This no-man's-land of media culture is Coupland's home ground. Coupland looks through the darkened glass of satire; but he also has a visionary lens through which he imagines his characters' redemption.
