The Book of Ralph: A Novel: A Fiction - Softcover

McNally, John

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0743257774 ISBN 13: 9780743257770

Publisher: Free Press, 2005

Synopsis

All of us need a Ralph in our lives. Chicago, 1978. Hank Boyd, a solid B+ student, a good kid, wants eighth grade to be his special year. But when Ralph, an oddball troublemaker who ' s been held back twice, gets the idea that he and Hank are pals, Hank's year devolves into an odyssey as frightening as it is hilarious. John McNally, acclaimed author of Troublemakers, deftly portrays the astonishing, sometimes terrifying world of adolescence in 1970s America: The adult world becomes increasingly untrustworthy, the economy plummets, and families seem to be falling apart, yet the two boys manage to create their own small moments of transcendence. At once wary and full of wonder, Hank and Ralph will win your heart with their outrageous, poignant, and occasionally scary antics - and they will teach you something about the ties that bind us together, hold us back, and redeem us.

About this title

Review

"Sometimes hazy, occasionally wistful, often picaresque chapters are delivered with a satirist's perfect understated pitch and announce John McNally -- also the author of Trouble-makers, a collection of stories -- as a gifted meta-memoirist." -- "The Washington Post" ""The Book of Ralph" is like a collection of strange and wonderful objects set out on the lawn, a carnival of vivid memories. It should earn John McNally the audience that his talent and wit deserve." -- "Chicago Tribune"

Synopsis

Chicago, 1978. Hank Boyd, a solid B+ student, a good kid, wants eighth grade to be his special year. But when Ralph, a troublemaker who's failed both the third and fifth grades, starts thinking that he and Hank are best friends, Hank's year becomes an odyssey that is as frightening as it is hilarious. Hank and Ralph join forces with Ralph's older cousins, Norm and Kenny, employees of the Tootsie Roll factory, and together they wreak havoc over Chicago's southwest side. It's a year of Styx, Cheap Trick, and Kiss, of Star Wars and CB radios, and of two very different boys attempting to make sense of the world, and of each other. When Hank, in a chance encounter, bumps into Ralph twenty-two years later, he quickly learns how much the past has a stranglehold on the present, and he can't help slipping back into the same role he played as a kid - a role that, as an adult, is fraught with far more serious consequences. THE BOOK OF RALPH is exquisitely rendered and defiantly unsentimental - a smart, assured novel from a wickedly astute young writer.

About this edition

• Publisher: Free Press
• Publication date: 2005
• ISBN 10: 0743257774
• ISBN 13: 9780743257770
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 306