American Purgatorio

Reviews / Votes

When a man emerges from a petrol station to find his wife and his car have mysteriously disappeared, the stage is set for one of the cleverest yarns in years, the literary equivalent of an American road movie, but with a twist in the tail that is both poignant and unexpected. * * The Sunday Telegraph * * Wildly original, wonderful, amazing, tender, heart-breaking. -- Geoff Dyer ...Haskell's book is a dazzling metaphysical high-wire act - compelling, deeply moving, mordantly funny and disquieting in equal measure. * * Telegraph * * I have just finished reading this wonderful book and feel like I am floating on blue air along the shoreline. It's a fresh, light, deep, sad, funny, moving, trippy dream of a novel. I loved the innocence of both the narrator - and his narrative voice - and the events of his journey, while the structure of the book is, though simple, so clever. John Haskell deals with profound matters - a journey through grief, a journey through death - in an entrancing way. It's a beautiful novel. -- Tim Pears