Synopsis Lenore Beadsman, a student of Wittgensteinian philosophy, searches for her 92-year-old grandmother (also named Lenore) on the edge of the state-constructed Great Ohio Desert--aka GOD. Her experiences on this quest amount to a stylized coming-of-age novel and a detailed fantasy on the play between language and reality.
| Details | | Publication Date: | 1993-05-01 | | Edition Description: | Reprint |
| Size | | Length: | 467 pages | | Height: | 8.3 in | | Width: | 5.5 in | | Thickness: | 1.2 in | | Weight: | 14.4 oz |
Publisher's Note An original and exciting debut, set in 1990 Cleveland, where a bewitching heroine who works for a screwed-up publishing firm is caught up with her not-so-hot lover/boss, her grandmother--who has just run away from her nursing home--and her pet cockatiel, whose verbal banter makes him a target for religious fundamentalists.
Industry Reviews "['The Broom of the System'] elicited cries of 'Pynchonesque!' from diverse quarters; some of them to be sure, using the adjective in its usual sense, i.e., as reviewer's code for 'I didn't finish it,' others so besotted with Pynchon that they see his scat everywhere, a few finding genuine similarities." Los Angeles Times Book Review - David Kipen (02/11/1996)
"...Wallace makes it all come together as a unified vision of inspired madness. This is Wallace's first novel. God help us all when he gets some practice." "Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction" - Orson Scott Card
"A manic, human, flawed extravaganza...emerging straight from the excessive tradition of Stanly Elkin's 'Franchiser', Thomas Pynchon's 'V', John Irving's 'The World According to Garp'." McClatchy
| See an error? Submit a change request |