Synopses & Reviews
Echoing a narrative line that includes Kurt Vonnegut and Joseph Heller, William Giraldi's Busy Monsters has been hailed as one of the most exciting fiction debuts in years. Penned with a linguistic bravado that explores the diaphanous line between fiction and fact, this "very funny, very inventive début novel" (The New Yorker) has at last revived the great American picaresque tradition.
"Comedy, satire, farce, language. . . . [A] release from the familiar and banal . . . has the kind of agenda that gives heft to the picaresque novels from which it is derived."--New York Times Book Review, Editors' Choice
"Wonderful. . . . Singular and arresting . . . filled with quirky turns of phrase, unexpected literary and cultural allusions, self-aware asides, and highfalutin word choices that would make Roget swell with pride."--Salon
"[A] riotous debut novel."--Publishers Weekly, starred review
"A brilliant first novel that may well be in the running for 2011 literary awards."--Library Journal, starred review
Review
"Comedy, satire, farce, language. . . . [A] release from the familiar and banal . . . has the kind of agenda that gives heft to the picaresque novels from which it is derived." New York Times Book Review, Editors' Choice
Review
"Wonderful. . . . Singular and arresting . . . filled with quirky turns of phrase, unexpected literary and cultural allusions, self-aware asides, and highfalutin word choices that would make Roget swell with pride." Salon
Review
"Starred Review. [A] riotous debut novel." Publishers Weekly
Review
"Starred Review. A brilliant first novel that may well be in the running for 2011 literary awards." Library Journal
Synopsis
Memoirist of mediocre fame, Charles Homar has a problem: his bride-to-be, Gillian Lee, has nixed their nuptials and fled to the high seas in search of a legendary giant squid, unleashing an unholy heart wreck upon him. In a hell-bent effort to prove his mettle as an American male and win back Gillian's affections, Charlie crisscrosses the nation seeking counsel, confronting creatures both mythic and real Bigfoot on the Canadian border, space aliens in Seattle, a professional bodybuilder with Asiatic sex slaves in suburban New Jersey, the demons dancing a rumba inside his own heart and then writing about his travails every week for a popular slick magazine. Echoing a narrative tradition that includes Don Quixote and Kurt Vonnegut's Breakfast of Champions, William Giraldi's debut novel is a love story of linguistic bravado that explores American excess, the diaphanous line between fiction and fact, and what desperate men and women will do to one another.
Synopsis
"The best literary present . . . has a delicate sweetness that shows through at just the right moments."--Ron Charles,
Synopsis
Echoing a narrative line that includes Kurt Vonnegut and Joseph Heller, William Giraldi's has been hailed as one of the most exciting fiction debuts in years. Penned with a linguistic bravado that explores the diaphanous line between fiction and fact, this "very funny, very inventive début novel" () has at last revived the great American picaresque tradition.
About the Author
William Giraldi's work has appeared in the New York Times Book Review, Georgia Review, The Believer, Kenyon Review, and Poets & Writers. A senior editor at AGNI, he teaches in the Arts & Sciences Writing Program at Boston University.