Sam Lipsyte has always been a funny, engrossing writer, but with this latest novel the author of Home Land, Venus Drive and The Subject Steve is staking his claim as the city's singular source for mordant laughter.
The Ask is the story of Milo Burke, a more-or-less employed development officer at a small university whose further solvency depends on his wooing of one major, mysterious donor. The book discusses, with varying levels of terror, "work, war, sex, class, child rearing, romantic comedies, Benjamin Franklin, cooking shows on death row, and the eroticization of chicken wire." Sam will be here to discuss the book with his celebrated editor at FSG, Lorin Stein.
News of Note
The Maltese Falcon
Written by David
Thursday, 25 June 2009
by Dashiell Hammett (Vintage Crime, $12.95)
Don't think that because this book is shelved in the mystery section that low-brow, formulaic, genre fiction is all that awaits you. Dashiell Hammett is the supreme stylist of a very literary breed of detective fiction. I picked up The Maltese Falcon thinking it would be a great mindless pool-side vacation book. What an underestimation! It fit the page-turning bill with a style and sophistication that I didn't expect. There's nothing mindless here.
Don't think that because this book is shelved in the mystery section that low-brow, formulaic, genre fiction is all that awaits you. Dashiell Hammett is the supreme stylist of a very literary breed of detective fiction. I picked up The Maltese Falcon thinking it would be a great mindless pool-side vacation book. What an underestimation! It fit the page-turning bill with a style and sophistication that I didn't expect. There's nothing mindless here.