Describe your latest work. When I started working on Plant-Thinking in 2008, I had no idea that the project would turn out to be as broad as it did....
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Danielle Marshall, January 30, 2013 (view all comments by Danielle Marshall)
The strongest contemplative young male character voice since The Catcher in the Rye. The book perfectly captures the randy young male eye - and that eye ultimately sees the grotesque and out of touch American praise of wartime heroism. Billy Lynn's conflict between service and self haunted me long after the last page.
jcnoble, January 1, 2013 (view all comments by jcnoble)
A book I couldn't stop reading and now can't stop thinking about. I gave it as gifts to several people. I will probably re-read it at some point in the future, which is something I rarely do.
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Waney, December 31, 2012 (view all comments by Waney)
If you saw and enjoyed the compelling TV series Generation Kill, then I think you will love this book. There are many outrageous claims made for the book on the back of the proof copy I read and, I have to say, they all stand up. This is classic literature that will stand the test of time; classic in the sense that it joins a long list of stories about the damage done to young men by a foreign war and the difficulties they face in re-adapting to their homeland. It is also a damning, lacerating dissection of a certain facet of United States society - of those people who are well content to talk the talk of war but are happily oblivious of the cost. The story is also consistently funny - bitingly so - and all the more heartbreaking for that.
Katsuya, December 28, 2012 (view all comments by Katsuya)
I was a huge fan of Ben Fountain's short story collection Brief Encounters With Che Guevara, so I was eagerly anticipating his first novel. The novel focuses on one of the author's favorite themes - innocents serving as the pawns for power players in the world of politics. The writing on every page is dazzling, and his gift at description, character building and lyricism are so jaw-droppingly good I found myself highlighting section after section until I stopped because I would have highlighted the whole book.Once I started reading, I couldn't put the book down. The story is heartbreaking and penetrating and feels, ultimately, too true.
"Synopsis"
by Harper Collins,
Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction and a finalist for the National Book Award!
From the PEN/Hemingway Award-winning author of the critically acclaimed short story collection, Brief Encounters with Che Guevara, comes Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk ("The Catch-22 of the Iraq War" —Karl Marlantes).
A razor-sharp satire set in Texas during America's war in Iraq, it explores the gaping national disconnect between the war at home and the war abroad.
Ben Fountains remarkable debut novel follows the surviving members of the heroic Bravo Squad through one exhausting stop in their media-intensive "Victory Tour" at Texas Stadium, football mecca of the Dallas Cowboys, their fans, promoters, and cheerleaders.
"Synopsis"
by Harper Collins,
A finalist for the National Book Award!
Three minutes and forty-three seconds of intense warfare with Iraqi insurgents has transformed the eight surviving men of Bravo Squad into America's most sought-after heroes. Now they're on a media-intensive nationwide tour to reinvigorate support for the war. On this rainy Thanksgiving, the Bravos are guests of the Dallas Cowboys, slated to be part of the halftime show alongside Destiny's Child.
Among the Bravos is Specialist Billy Lynn. Surrounded by patriots sporting flag pins on their lapels and Support Our Troops bumper stickers, he is thrust into the company of the Cowboys' owner and his coterie of wealthy colleagues; a born-again Cowboys cheerleader; a veteran Hollywood producer; and supersized players eager for a vicarious taste of war. Over the course of this day, Billy will drink and brawl, yearn for home and mourn those missing, face a heart-wrenching decision, and discover pure love and a bitter wisdom far beyond his years.
Powell's City of Books is an independent bookstore in Portland, Oregon, that fills a whole city block with more than a million new, used, and out of print books. Shop those shelves — plus literally millions more books, DVDs, and eBooks — here at Powells.com.
