Ten stories narrated by a young recovering alcoholic, whose dependency has led him to crime, cruelty, and loss in the Midwest, each depict, with haunting perception, the disparity of emotions that constitute the American experience.
"In a world of predictable fiction, Jesus' Son is a point-blank godsend.""L.A. Weekly"His prose. . .consistently gnerations imagery of ferocious intensity, much of it shaded with a menacing, even deranged sense of humor. No American novelist since William Burroughs has so flagrantly risked 'insensitivity' in an effort to depict the pathology of addiction.""New York Times Book Review"Denis Johnson is an amazingly talented writer, a synthesizer of profoundly American voices: We can hear Twain in his biting irony, Whitman in his erotic excess, not a little of Dashiell Hammett too in the hard sentences he throws back at his gouged, wounded world. And behind all these you sense something else: a visionary angel, a Kerouac or, better yet, a Blake, who has seen his demon and yearned for God and forged a language to contain them both.""Newsday"Reading these stories is like reading ticker tape from the subconscious."Marianne Wiggins, "The Nation"Denis Johnson's path as a writer--from poetry to the novel to the short story--is an untypical as his vision, but "Jesus' Son may eventually be read not just as a moment in his evolution but as a distinctive turn in the history of the form. He is doing something deeply new in these stories, and the formal novelty brings us into a new intimacy with the violence that is rising around us in this country like the killing waters of a flood.""Atlantic Monthly"The narrator of these interlinked stories is a young man, reelig from his addiction to heroin and alcohol, his mind at once clouded and made gorgeously lucid by these drugs. Dreams blur into real life for this man, hallucinations mimic and merge with reality: a state of affairs that gives Mr. Johnsonample opportunity to display his dazzling gift for poetic language, his natural instinct for metaphor and wordplay."Michiko Kakutani, "New York Times"Denis Johnson's most accessible and accomplished book, from start to finish, without a single sentence that misses the mark.""Los Angeles Times"These tales are told with apparent carelesness, a kind of grinding realism which would suggest that these events are as purposeless as they seem. But at heart Johnson is a metaphysician, and through the luminous windows that startlingly open in the deadpan prose. . .we are bystanders to an act of testimony."Madison Smartt Bell, "USA Today"Intense, vicious, and beautiful, these storeis are fraught with a cutting wit purposefully juxtaposed against the too-big sentimentality of a drunk. Denis Johnson is an exquisite writer."Mary Gaitskill"A work of spare beauty and almost religious intensity.""Entertainment Weekly"Johnson has the distinction of being both a poet and a novelist of gritty realism who uses language like a paring knofe to slice through to the bones of his subject matter....[These stories] are as muscular and tight as a washboard stomach, as resonant as a drum.""People
"Reading these stories is like reading ticker tape from the subconscious."--"The Nation
""A work of spare beauty and almost religious intensity."--"Entertainment Weekly
""Intense, vicious, and beautiful, these stories are fraught with a cutting wit purposefully juxtaposed against the too-big sentimentality of a drunk. Denis Johnson is an exquisite writer."--Mary Gaitskill
"[Dennis Johnson is] a synthesizer of profoundly American voices: we can hear Twain in his biting irony, Whitman in his erotic excess, not a little of Dashiell Hammett too in the hard sentences he throws back at his gouged, wounded world. And behind all these you sense something else: a visionary angel, a Kerouac, or, better yet, a Blake, who has seen his demon and yearned for God and forged a language to contain them both."--"Newsday"
"Ferocious intensity. . . . No American novelist since William Burroughs has so flagrantly risked 'insensitivity' in an effort to depict the pathology of addiction."--"The New York Times Book Review "
"Reading these stories is like reading ticker tape from the subconscious." --"The Nation"
"A work of spare beauty and almost religious intensity." --"Entertainment Weekly"
"Intense, vicious, and beautiful, these stories are fraught with a cutting wit purposefully juxtaposed against the too-big sentimentality of a drunk. Denis Johnson is an exquisite writer." --"Mary Gaitskill"
"[Dennis Johnson is] a synthesizer of profoundly American voices: we can hear Twain in his biting irony, Whitman in his erotic excess, not a little of Dashiell Hammett too in the hard sentences he throws back at his gouged, wounded world. And behind all these you sense something else: a visionary angel, a Kerouac, or, better yet, a Blake, who has seen his demon and yearned for God and forged a language to contain them both." --"Newsday"
"Ferocious intensity. . . . No American novelist since William Burroughs has so flagrantly risked 'insensitivity' in an effort to depict the pathology of addiction." --"The New York Times Book Review"
Reading these stories is like reading ticker tape from the subconscious. "The Nation"
A work of spare beauty and almost religious intensity. "Entertainment Weekly"
Intense, vicious, and beautiful, these stories are fraught with a cutting wit purposefully juxtaposed against the too-big sentimentality of a drunk. Denis Johnson is an exquisite writer. "Mary Gaitskill"
[Dennis Johnson is] a synthesizer of profoundly American voices: we can hear Twain in his biting irony, Whitman in his erotic excess, not a little of Dashiell Hammett too in the hard sentences he throws back at his gouged, wounded world. And behind all these you sense something else: a visionary angel, a Kerouac, or, better yet, a Blake, who has seen his demon and yearned for God and forged a language to contain them both. "Newsday"
Ferocious intensity. . . . No American novelist since William Burroughs has so flagrantly risked 'insensitivity' in an effort to depict the pathology of addiction. "The New York Times Book Review""
Reading these stories is like reading ticker tape from the subconscious. The Nation
A work of spare beauty and almost religious intensity. Entertainment Weekly
Intense, vicious, and beautiful, these stories are fraught with a cutting wit purposefully juxtaposed against the too-big sentimentality of a drunk. Denis Johnson is an exquisite writer. Mary Gaitskill
[Dennis Johnson is] a synthesizer of profoundly American voices: we can hear Twain in his biting irony, Whitman in his erotic excess, not a little of Dashiell Hammett too in the hard sentences he throws back at his gouged, wounded world. And behind all these you sense something else: a visionary angel, a Kerouac, or, better yet, a Blake, who has seen his demon and yearned for God and forged a language to contain them both. Newsday
Ferocious intensity. . . . No American novelist since William Burroughs has so flagrantly risked 'insensitivity' in an effort to depict the pathology of addiction. The New York Times Book Review
"
"Reading these stories is like reading ticker tape from the subconscious." --The Nation
"A work of spare beauty and almost religious intensity." --Entertainment Weekly
"Intense, vicious, and beautiful, these stories are fraught with a cutting wit purposefully juxtaposed against the too-big sentimentality of a drunk. Denis Johnson is an exquisite writer." --Mary Gaitskill
"[Dennis Johnson is] a synthesizer of profoundly American voices: we can hear Twain in his biting irony, Whitman in his erotic excess, not a little of Dashiell Hammett too in the hard sentences he throws back at his gouged, wounded world. And behind all these you sense something else: a visionary angel, a Kerouac, or, better yet, a Blake, who has seen his demon and yearned for God and forged a language to contain them both." --Newsday
"Ferocious intensity. . . . No American novelist since William Burroughs has so flagrantly risked 'insensitivity' in an effort to depict the pathology of addiction." --The New York Times Book Review
