The Broom of the System by David Foster Wallace
Wallace without the humility or the humanity.
Status: Just say the word.
AS COLLEGE FICTION WRITING GOES, this novel — which began as one of David Foster Wallace’s undergraduate theses — is some of the best you’ll find. But if you know anything about college fiction (and I include graduate workshops in this category as well), you know that’s not exactly praise. Wallace is too enchanted with his own intellect and subversiveness to really tell a good story here, and it all ends up just feeling like unhappiness. Not even sadness. Just unhappiness.
There are some good parts, and at times I found myself thinking, “Wow! That was written by an undergraduate?” But for the most part my reaction was, “Yep. That was written by an undergraduate.”