Synopses & Reviews
Taylor Antrim& #39; s debut novel is a darkly comic, clear-eyed look at hidden worlds whose complexities and rules can be understood only from inside: the insular hothouse of boarding school, the thorny dynamics between father and son, and the self-delusion of blind ideological commitment.< br=""> Dyer Martin, a new history teacher at the prestigious Britton School, arrives in the fall ready to close the door on the failures and disappointments of his past: a disastrous first job, a broken relationship, and acute uncertainty about his future. James, a lonely senior, just wants to make it through his last year unscathed, avoiding both the brutal hazing of dorm life and the stern and unforgiving eye of his father, the school& #39; s politically radical headmaster, Edward Wolfe.< br=""> Soon, however, both Dyer and James are inescapably drawn into Wolfe& #39; s hidden agenda for Britton, as the headmaster orders Dyer to set up and run a Model UN Club for students. As the United States moves steadily toward a conflict with an increasingly hostile North Korea & mdash; whose pursuit of nuclear technology is pushing the world to the brink of nuclear Armageddon & mdash; Wolfe& #39; s political fervor begins to consume him, and he sets in motion a plan that will jeopardize his job, his school, and even the life of his own son.< br=""> With precisely controlled, deceptively subtle storytelling, The Headmaster Ritual is an insightful and captivating examination of the halting, complicated course young men must chart to shake off the influence of fathers & mdash; and father figures & mdash; while refining their convictions about the world and their place in it.
Synopsis
Taylor Antrims debut novel is a darkly comic, clear-eyed look at hidden worlds whose complexities and rules can be understood only from inside: the insular hothouse of boarding school, the thorny dynamics between father and son, and the self-delusion of blind ideological commitment.
Dyer Martin, a new history teacher at the prestigious Britton School, arrives in the fall ready to close the door on the failures and disappointments of his past: a disastrous first job, a broken relationship, and acute uncertainty about his future. James, a lonely senior, just wants to make it through his last year unscathed, avoiding both the brutal hazing of dorm life and the stern and unforgiving eye of his father, the schools politically radical headmaster, Edward Wolfe.
Soon, however, both Dyer and James are inescapably drawn into Wolfes hidden agenda for Britton, as the headmaster orders Dyer to set up and run a Model UN Club for students. As the United States moves steadily toward a conflict with an increasingly hostile North Korea -- whose pursuit of nuclear technology is pushing the world to the brink of nuclear Armageddon -- Wolfes political fervor begins to consume him, and he sets in motion a plan that will jeopardize his job, his school, and even the life of his own son.
With precisely controlled, deceptively subtle storytelling, The Headmaster Ritual is an insightful and captivating examination of the halting, complicated course young men must chart to shake off the influence of fathers -- and father figures -- while refining their convictions about the world and their place in it.
Synopsis
A novel about boarding school, hardcore Scrabble fanatics, and frackingand#8212;a new kind of environmental novel by a spokesman and chief strategist for Common Cause.
Synopsis
The Fracking Kingand#160;follows Winston Crwthand#8212;a boarding-school kid, loner, and Scrabble prodigyand#8212;who becomes an unlikely hero in the fight to stop fracking in Pennsylvania. Truth is a rare commodity in politics, and the idea of and#8220;winningand#8221; a debate as cleanly and simply as youand#8217;d win a Scrabble game can seem impossible. But with the truth on his side, a jar of toxic and#8220;frackwater,and#8221; and the belief that he can win a Scrabble tournament whose first prize is a meeting with the governor, Winston creates a moment of devastating truth for her and for the people who want to frack the state.
For all its thoughtful environmental concerns, The Fracking King is also a hopeful book about the power of believing in yourself and pursuing your own particular genius. Winstonand#8217;s Scrabble prowess has its freakish side, but it also makes him genuinely heroic, and his lexical predicaments are funny, shocking, dirty, and sometimes mind-boggling. This is the rare, satisfying debut thatand#8217;s as playful as it is profound.
Synopsis
A striking debut novel about boarding school, hardcore Scrabble, and frackingand#8212;a new kind of environmental novel by an important voice in the debate about fracking in America.
When the tap water at the Hale Boarding School for Boys bursts into flames, people blame fracking. Life at Hale has always been fraughtand#8212;the swim test consists of being thrown into the pool with wrists and ankles tied, and a boy can be expelled if he and a girl keep fewer than and#8220;three feet on the floor.and#8221; But the sight of combustible drinking water and the possibility that fracking is making Hale kids sick turn one student into an unlikely hero in the fight to stop the controversial drilling practice.
Winston Crwth, a Scrabble prodigy whose baffling last name rhymes with and#8220;truth,and#8221; knows what itand#8217;s like to be and#8220;fractured,and#8221; having grown up with his father in Philadelphia and his mother in California. On Winstonand#8217;s comic journey to the Pennsylvania State Scrabble Championship, where he hopes to win an audience with beauty-queen-turned-governor Linda King LaRue, he matches wits with Thomasina Wodtke-Weir, the headmasterand#8217;s prematurely gray daughter and the most popular (read: only) girl at school; the state poet laureate, whose verse consists of copying out dictionary entries and restroom graffiti; and David Dark, son of the CEO of Dark Oil and Gas, the source of Winstonand#8217;s scholarship money.
The Fracking King is a fantastically inventive debut about rowing crew, using all your tiles, and trying to save the world.
About the Author
TAYLOR ANTRIM is an editor at ForbesLife and a regular contributor to the New York Times and Vogue. His work has appeared in Esquire, the San Francisco Chronicle, the Village Voice, and other magazines and journals. A graduate of Stanford and of Oxford, Antrim earned his MFA from Virginia, where he held the Poe-Faulkner Fellowship.