Description
'Kalfus has . . . produced a provocative and entertaining treatment of a very modern malady - a malady of mind and body politic' TELEGRAPH 12/8
'Kalfus' talent for description is undeniable. His portrayal of the collapse of the towers as seen from within, when "taffies of molten steel spilled from the upper floors of the towers, fragmenting into gorgeous sparks of blazing shrapnel when they hit the cold ground", is utterly enthralling' - FINANCIAL TIMES 19/8
'Ken Kalfus is a talent to watch. A Disorder Peculiar to the Country, the American writer's second novel, is a blistering portrait of a New York couple going through a divorce in the aftermath of the attacks on September 11, 2001 . . . What is most enjoyable about this novel is the verve and swagger with which Kalfus writes . . . The description of Marshall escaping the pandemonium on September 11 is a staggeringly controlled and moving piece of prose' Seven, Sunday Telegraph 4/9
'Ken Kalfus's second novel is the most original to be written about America's moral climate in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks. Ian McEwan, Jonathan Safran Foer, Jay McInerney and, more recently, Claire Messud and Deborah Eisenberg have employed the attacks as a new metonymy of conventional anxiety - the inevitable death's-head figure for any fiction set in the present. Kalfus, however, is the first to take on the clichéd idea that the terrorists really did inaugurate a new order and that the world, or at least our minds, changed the morning after' TLS 8/9
'If anyone is in any doubt that America is producing phenomenally experimental literature, then they need only look to Ken Kalfus . . . Where most writers would shy away, Kalfus rubs your nose in it as he tickles your ear. A Disorder Peculiar to the Country is a bold, provocative and ultimately sensitive novel' Scotland on Sunday 3/9
'The novel is at its best on the personal level, as an edgy story of contemporary divorce, reading as if Douglas Coupland had turned into a novelisation of KRAMER V KRAMER' Mark Lawson, Guardian 14/10
'The novel follows [Joyce and Marshall's] break-up against the backdrop of a traumatised New York, Kalfus neatly charting our solipsism in the face of world events' GQ, November issue
‘Kalfus – an extraordinary writer of growing pedigree – takes the modern banality of the US and weaves a tale that engages with almost every aspect of contemporary first-world, angst-ridden life. Amazing’ Glasgow Herald 7/7
‘Strong stuff, and there are some wincingly funny moments’ The Times 7/7
‘Kalfus – an extraordinary writer of growing pedigree – takes the modern banality of the US and weaves a tale that engages with almost every aspect of contemporary first-world, angst-ridden life. Amazing’ Glasgow Herald 7/7
‘Kalfus’s lack of inhibitions about good taste enables him to derive comic potential from such post-traumatic phenomena as “terror sex”…and grief counselors “moving about the new offices with the suspicious alertness of fire officers”’ Guardian 21/7
'Kalfus' talent for description is undeniable. His portrayal of the collapse of the towers as seen from within, when "taffies of molten steel spilled from the upper floors of the towers, fragmenting into gorgeous sparks of blazing shrapnel when they hit the cold ground", is utterly enthralling' - FINANCIAL TIMES 19/8
'Ken Kalfus is a talent to watch. A Disorder Peculiar to the Country, the American writer's second novel, is a blistering portrait of a New York couple going through a divorce in the aftermath of the attacks on September 11, 2001 . . . What is most enjoyable about this novel is the verve and swagger with which Kalfus writes . . . The description of Marshall escaping the pandemonium on September 11 is a staggeringly controlled and moving piece of prose' Seven, Sunday Telegraph 4/9
'Ken Kalfus's second novel is the most original to be written about America's moral climate in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks. Ian McEwan, Jonathan Safran Foer, Jay McInerney and, more recently, Claire Messud and Deborah Eisenberg have employed the attacks as a new metonymy of conventional anxiety - the inevitable death's-head figure for any fiction set in the present. Kalfus, however, is the first to take on the clichéd idea that the terrorists really did inaugurate a new order and that the world, or at least our minds, changed the morning after' TLS 8/9
'If anyone is in any doubt that America is producing phenomenally experimental literature, then they need only look to Ken Kalfus . . . Where most writers would shy away, Kalfus rubs your nose in it as he tickles your ear. A Disorder Peculiar to the Country is a bold, provocative and ultimately sensitive novel' Scotland on Sunday 3/9
'The novel is at its best on the personal level, as an edgy story of contemporary divorce, reading as if Douglas Coupland had turned into a novelisation of KRAMER V KRAMER' Mark Lawson, Guardian 14/10
'The novel follows [Joyce and Marshall's] break-up against the backdrop of a traumatised New York, Kalfus neatly charting our solipsism in the face of world events' GQ, November issue
‘Kalfus – an extraordinary writer of growing pedigree – takes the modern banality of the US and weaves a tale that engages with almost every aspect of contemporary first-world, angst-ridden life. Amazing’ Glasgow Herald 7/7
‘Strong stuff, and there are some wincingly funny moments’ The Times 7/7
‘Kalfus – an extraordinary writer of growing pedigree – takes the modern banality of the US and weaves a tale that engages with almost every aspect of contemporary first-world, angst-ridden life. Amazing’ Glasgow Herald 7/7
‘Kalfus’s lack of inhibitions about good taste enables him to derive comic potential from such post-traumatic phenomena as “terror sex”…and grief counselors “moving about the new offices with the suspicious alertness of fire officers”’ Guardian 21/7
Présentation de l'éditeur
To each other's regret, both Marshall and Joyce survived 9/11. But it looks unlikely that they will survive the apparently endless war of their divorce. Both refuse to move out of the apartment, on their lawyers' orders, and neither is above using the children as footsoldiers in their battle. They will use any psychological weapon that comes to hand - sex; money; friends; relations - to gain an advantage that might prove decisive.
As the months pass the domestic skirmishes begin to echo the international. In both theatres of war, events are becoming crazier, but people tend to break before nations do.
Ken Kalfus's new novel is a brilliantly insightful and compelling portrait of what our modern state of perpetual war does on the home front.
As the months pass the domestic skirmishes begin to echo the international. In both theatres of war, events are becoming crazier, but people tend to break before nations do.
Ken Kalfus's new novel is a brilliantly insightful and compelling portrait of what our modern state of perpetual war does on the home front.
