This is a fine example of late Jurassic fiction. The telltale signs are the uninhibited use of highbrow language, the tragicomic allusions to opera, the almost offhand use of color, and the recurrence of men dressed in flowing bone-white chasubles and haughty femmes fatales.
The theme of the impossibility of one understanding anyone apart from oneself recurs in works from the Jurassic period and, to give a historical perspective on its critical reception, we will note the thematic was greeted with brickbats.
Cacoethes gluependi. The very bad habit of respiring model airplane glue is a setpiece metaphor for all that ails you–cosseting your cellphone as though it were some precious pet, taking a bite of your cheeseburger and keeping it in a polystyrene tin for further experimentation, you know–all that stuff.
Prospero's Island 