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Library | Shelf Number | Shelf Location | Status |
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Searching... Fall River Main | FIC EVE | Stacks | Searching... Unknown |
Searching... New Bedford Free Public Library | FIC EVERETT | FICTION | Searching... Unknown |
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Summary
Summary
Avant-garde novelist and college professor, woodworker, and fly fisherman - Thelonious Ellison has never allowed race to define his identity. But as both a writer and an African American he is offended and angered by the success of We's Lives in Da Getto.
Reviews (4)
Publisher's Weekly Review
Everett's (Glyph; Frenzy; etc.) latest is an over-the-top masterpiece about an African-American writer who "overcomes" his intellectual tendency to "write white" and ends up penning a parody of ghetto fiction that becomes a huge commercial and literary success. Thelonius "Monk" Ellison is an erudite, accomplished but seldom-read author who insists on writing obscure literary papers rather than the so-called "ghetto prose" that would make him a commercial success. He finally succumbs to temptation after seeing the Oberlin-educated author of We's Lives in da Ghetto during her appearance on a talk show, firing back with a parody called My Pafology, which he submits to his startled agent under the gangsta pseudonym of Stagg R. Leigh. Ellison quickly finds himself with a six-figure advance from a major house, a multimillion-dollar offer for the movie rights and a monster bestseller on his hands. The money helps with a family crisis, allowing Ellison to care for his widowed mother as she drifts into the fog of Alzheimer's, but it doesn't ease the pain after his sister, a physician, is shot by right-wing fanatics for performing abortions. The dark side of wealth surfaces when both the movie mogul and talk-show host demand to meet the nonexistent Leigh, forcing Ellison to don a disguise and invent a sullen, enigmatic character to meet the demands of the market. The final indignity occurs when Ellison becomes a judge for a major book award and My Pafology (title changed to Fuck) gets nominated, forcing the author to come to terms with his perverse literary joke. Percival's talent is multifaceted, sparked by a satiric brilliance that could place him alongside Wright and Ellison as he skewers the conventions of racial and political correctness. (Sept. 21) Forecast: Everett has been well-reviewed before, but his latest far surpasses his previous efforts. Passionate word of mouth (of which there should be plenty), rave reviews (ditto) and the startling cover (a young, smiling black boy holding a toy gun to his head) could help turn this into a genuine publishing event. (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Kirkus Review
Desperation outstrips the satire in Everett's latest exercise in narrative wizardry (Glyph, 1999, etc.), as a lonely African-American writer faces private torment and instant fame when his parody of ghetto literature is taken as the real deal. His own generation's version of an invisible man, Thelonious Ellison, a.k.a. Monk, is a largely unknown academic novelist who visits hometown Washington, D.C., to give a paper and see his mother and sister. No sooner does he return to California than Sis, a doctor in an abortion clinic, is shot dead at work. Someone has to take care of Mom, who's showing the first wrenching signs of Alzheimer's, so Monk returns home. There, his frustration with a runaway bestseller written in ghettospeak by a bourgeois black woman after visiting Harlem for a couple of days is fueled by endless rejections of his own new manuscript; in a rage he pumps out a parody and sends it under a pseudonym to his agent-who promptly secures a six-figure advance and a seven-figure movie deal. Stunned that no one recognizes his book as a send-up, Monk refuses to let his true identity be known. Meanwhile, he must cope with his mother's rapid decline, his gay brother's sudden animosity, and the discovery among his father's papers of letters indicating not only that Dad had a white mistress long ago, but that Monk has a half-sister his age. Struggling to maintain his own identity as his creation looms larger than life and his family redefines itself, he makes choices that render him invisible no more. More genuine and tender than much of Everett's previous work, but no less impressive intellectually: a high point in an already substantial literary career.
Booklist Review
Thelonius "Monk" Ellison, author of experimental novels, is somewhat estranged from his family because he was favored by an emotionally distant, recently deceased father. When his sister is killed, Monk returns to Washington, D.C., to care for his mother, who is in the early stages of Alzheimer's disease. At the same time that he deals with family crises, Monk is also in the midst of a professional crisis after the seventh rejection of his most recent novel. In a fury over the success of We's Lives in Da Ghetto, a debut novel by a black woman exploiting racial stereotypes, Monk writes his own ultra ghetto novel. It is a parody, reminiscent of Native Son but with none of the pathos and perspective. Monk's main character is an Ebonics-spouting brute with no regard for his four children or their respective mothers. To his chagrin, the novel is a success, and Monk is left to struggle with artistic ethics versus the comforts of wealth. A scathingly funny look at racism and the book business: editors, publishers, readers, and writers alike. --Vanessa Bush
Library Journal Review
The author of 13 books, including Frenzy (1997) and Glyph (2001), Everett returns with a dark satire on race relations and publishing. Thelonius Monk Ellison is a gifted writer of experimental fiction whose commercial success is hampered by his not being black enough for the (mostly white) literary world. With his family life disintegrating around him and his career on the verge of extinction, Ellison vents his frustration by writing a novel titled My Pafology under the pen name Stagg R. Leigh. My Pafology is a blistering send-up of the ghetto-vEritE genre that rewrites Native Son with a vicious twist, but the prank turns out to be a runaway success as critics mistake it for a raw and honest account of black life. Ellison attempts to keep up this fraud, but the strain becomes too much and his sanity begins to slip away, leading to a chilling though understated climax at a prestigious book-awards ceremony. Everett makes good use of his literary antecedents, most notably Richard Wright and Ralph Ellison, reworking their themes in intriguing ways. This is an important novel from a well-established American author; recommended for all collections.Philip Santo, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.