Editing Lydia Millet (section)

=== ''How the Dead Dream'' (2008) ===
''How the Dead Dream'' is "a frightening and gorgeous view of human decline," according to Utne Reader. It features a young [[Los Angeles]] real estate developer consumed by power and political ambitions who, after his mother's suicide attempt and two other deaths, begins to nurture a curious obsession with vanishing species. Then a series of calamities forces him from a tropical island, the site on
one of his developments, onto the mainland where he takes a [[Joseph Conrad|Conrad]]-esque journey up a river into the remote jungle. ''[[Eye Weekly]]'' summarized this [[black comedy]], noting "American culture loves its stories of hubris, downfall and ruin as of late, but it takes a writer of Millet's sensitivity to enjoy the way down this much."