November 1, 2019
What happens when a bag of money suddenly falls from the sky at the feet of a man struggling to get by? That's the premise of this wickedly absurdist satire from Wright (The Amalgamation Polka) set in the not-too-distant future. While aimlessly looking for work one day, the unemployed Graveyard is in the right place at the right time when a large bag of money falls from the window of a skyscraper, and he knows exactly what to do with this gift from above. He and wife Ambience begin living the good life, filling their small apartment near to bursting with expensive new acquisitions and indulging themselves in every way possible. There is soon trouble in paradise, however, as the owner of the money, a Wall Street Master of the Universe type named MisterMenu, wants his money back and will stop at nothing--including murder--to get it. What follows is a chase first through the metropolis of Mammoth City and eventually through Randomburg, Graveyard's boyhood hometown, as the pair attempt to stay a step ahead of MisterMenu's hired guns. VERDICT While the satire is occasionally obvious and over-the-top, this is a richly comic--and one might say, right on the money--evisceration of our dollar-worshiping culture. [See Prepub Alert, 7/1/19.]--Lawrence Rungren, Andover, MA
Copyright 2019 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
Starred review from October 15, 2019
Wright (The Amalgamation Polka, 2006, etc.) holds up a fun-house mirror to our money-obsessed society--and, after a while, the distorted reflection grows uncomfortably close to real life. It's one of the oldest and most persistent hypotheticals haunting our collective dream life: Suppose a big bag of money drops from the sky right in front of you and there's nobody around to claim it. Such is the astonishing, intoxicating situation facing Graveyard, an economically challenged resident of Mammoth City, the grandest metropolis in an alternate-universe America. He and his wife, Ambience, are literally rolling in their fat new pile of fresh dough, unaware that the bag belongs to MisterMenu, a master of the universe inhabiting a luxury penthouse in the 52-story Eyedropper Building with his jaded, aggrieved ex-supermodel wife, MissusMenu, who, in a fit of pique, threw the bag at him and watched it sail "over the parapet" and "into the anonymous city." As MisterMenu contrives with dark forces to retrieve his lost sack, its seemingly inexhaustible contents are being heedlessly, giddily flung all over town by Graveyard and Ambience. The happy couple begins their spending spree by "refurbish[ing] their dilapidated lives with product purchased almost exclusively in the TooGoodForYou District." That clause alone exemplifies some of the dry wit served by Wright, whose deconstruction of American myths using page-turning narrative and unsettling imagery was previously displayed in such novels as Going Native (1994). Even as his characters' indulgence in empty pleasures becomes ickier, riskier, and more life threatening, Wright sustains a vision that comes across like an updated "Thimble Theater" comic strip from the 1930s juiced with the free-wheeling, whacked-out comedy of a vintage 1970s Firesign Theater LP. The book's unending stream of uproarious faux brand names--such as StandUpAndCheer, DominationDonuts, the Gibe & Cloister 418 firearm, and WalleyedMonks Champagne--doesn't distract from the ferocious and mostly effective assault on our own world's obsession with getting, spending, and having, whether it's sex, drugs, guns, cars, clothes, appliances, or shelter. This dark, harrowing, and wildly funny novel somehow both challenges and affirms that tried-and-true adage: Money isn't everything.
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September 16, 2019
The disappointing latest from Wright (Going Native) takes place in an alternate reality much like the current world, except that every place, every brand name, almost every proper noun has morphed into something bizarre. The “Eyedropper” building provides a view of “ReadyToWear” river; all the characters have outlandish names like BlisterPac, DelicateSear, and Graveyard. One day a giant bag of money falls out of the sky, and Graveyard picks it up and takes it home. Now he and his wife, Ambience, are fantastically wealthy, and they proceed to spend their fat stacks on bottles of “LaughFrogg,” a “HomoDebonaire” car, a “LampLighter 505” gun, and anything else they could possibly desire. But of course the money really belongs to someone else—a horny corporate titan named MisterMenu, who sends his goon BlisterPac to track down the bag’s whereabouts. Graveyard and Ambience retreat to the farm country of Randomburg, but BlisterPac is hot on the trail. Various subplots and asides about Graveyard’s disaffected siblings SideEffects and Farrago add some depth to the hollow main characters. But this hypersexualized, hypercommercialized surreal world never feels consequential or any less absurd than the characters’ names or circumstances. Wright’s goofy postmodern tale of money, sex, and guns is imaginative but trivial.
December 15, 2019
It all begins when a seemingly bottomless bag of money literally falls from the sky next to Graveyard, an unambitious dreamer. His newfound wealth lifts his depressed, bedridden wife, Ambience, out of her stupor, and Graveyard and Ambience begin to spend voraciously. As they are tailed by the grotesque MisterMenu?who wants his money back?they encounter a series of outlandish characters, each obsessed with some mixture of money, violence, or pleasure. Like Mark Leyner's Et Tu, Babe (1992) or Chris Bachelder's Bear v. Shark (2001), much-awarded Wright tells this unnerving tale in relentless prose that feels like one is flicking through channels on late-night television, or leaving YouTube on autoplay. Exploring the conspiracies, crimes, and proclivities of the hyperwealthy, Wright's novel holds up a funhouse mirror to our time that solely reflects the vacuous, the excessive, and the grotesque. In this road novel, cartoonish satire, and brutal exploration of the influence of capital, Wright's unique voice, much lauded by his peers, offers a darkly comic, often startlingly original vision of the contemporary world.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)