Better Hope the Reader Does
One use of simile in the novel interestingly reveals its underlying potential for success or failure. The power of the simile is derived from the familiarity of the comparison. A simile works best when one of the things is unfamiliar, not quite as well if both thing are very familiar and—as exemplified here—not very well at all if neither is familiar:
“Sometimes she's my personal Yoda. If Yoda was a woman and had a gold grill. Unfortunately, she doesn't know who Yoda is.”
“Her name just had to be Karen”
It’s not everyday that a commonly shared name or nickname makes the transformation into metaphor. In fact, the list is pretty short. Melvin is a nerd, Bubba is a redneck, Gertrude is old-fashioned, and at one time anyway, Rita was a slut. In remarkably quick fashion, Karen became a metaphor so instantly familiar that no explication was really required.
Rap
The hip-hop milieu of the story makes the addition of metaphor almost inevitable as a result of the influence of rap. The rhythmic metrical patterns rhyming couplets in the lyrics of rap songs have endowed a couple of generations now with a socially inherited gift exploiting the power of simile:
"You spit like a lisp. I spit like a high power.
Bri’s the future, and you Today like Matt Lauer”
Drug Culture
Although drug culture certain plays a role in the story due to the convergence of setting and situation, it by no means overwhelms. The reality of that convergence is primarily expressed through the way in which drug culture permeates throughout, touching even those not steeped within it such as this example of a straight-up metaphor for that very permeability:
“Considering how you’ve written some of the best rhymes I’ve ever heard in my life, I bet it is,” he says. “Like, ‘There’s a beast that roams my streets —’”
“‘—and he goes by the name of crack cocaine—’” I say my own lyrics.
Everybody Always Forgets C-3PO
Yoda is not the only Star Wars reference used as metaphorical shorthand in the story. The author capitalizes on the widespread misconception that the Star Wars prequels are by definition inferior to the original by having a character make a commonly observed—but woefully arguable—assertion. The important part, however, is that the narrator is also serving up an explication of what a metaphor is and how it should work:
Malik insists that Jar Jar Binks should be a verb, adjective, and an adverb to describe whack stuff because Jar Jar Binks is the worst character in the Star Wars universe.
