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Overview
Overview
Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award. A compelling and complusively readable riff on the classic detective novel from America's most inventive novelist. Brooklyn's very own self-appointed Human Freakshow, Lionel Essrog is an orphan whose Tourettic impulses drive him to bark, count, and rip apart our language in startling and original ways. Together with three veterans of the St. Vincent's Home for Boys, he works for small-time mobster Frank Minna's limo service cum detective agency. Life without Frank Minna, the charismatic King of Brooklyn, would be unimaginable, so who cares if the tasks he sets them are, well, not exactly legal. But when Frank is fatally stabbed, one of Lionel's colleagues lands in jail, the other two vie for his position, and the victim's widow skips town. Lionel's world is suddenly topsy-turvy, and this outcast who has trouble even conversing attempts to untangle the threads of the case while trying to keep the words straight in his head. Motherless Brooklyn is a brilliantly original, captivating homage to the classic detective novel by one of the most acclaimed writers of his generation. A New York Times Notable Book.
- Format: TradePaperback
- Author: Lethem, Jonathan
- ISBN: 9780375724831
- Condition: Used
- Dimensions: 8.00 x 0.75
- Number Of Pages: 336
- Publication Year: 2000
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A mystery even for those who don't like mystery.
James F. - 4 years 7 months agoI have always found it difficult to recommend books. I love the classics and no one needs to tell you to read "Hunchback of Notre Dame" or "Catcher in the Rye". So, when cornered and threatened with grave bodily harm unless I tell someone what they should read, I have a few "fall backs" I always go to. My number one is "Motherless Brooklyn" by Jonathan Lethem. The main character is a reluctant detective who suffers from obsessive compulsive disorder and Tourette's syndrome. This may sound redundant or clich to you, but handled by an author like Lethem, it is anything but. Being an homage to hard-boiled detective novels his book is the rare combination of gritty modern literature and page turning entertainment. It should be stated that although it is similar to classic noir it is still modern and contains a lot of adult content such as sex, violence and foul language. If those are not things that bother you, I can't recommend this book enough.
HPB Staff Review