Samedi the Deafness - Jesse Ball

Samedi the Deafness, the first novel from poet Jesse Ball, is generating excitement within a range of booksellers and bookshops at Harry W. Schwartz. I've enjoyed about two-thirds of its mystical pondering and abstract maze and will add my thoughts to those of my fellow booksellers when I find ninety minutes to finish this quick-flowing paperback original.

"This book confounds me every time I attempt to summarize or describe it. The story screams and clamors every time I pick it up and try to put it in a box. It's diamond-like in its brilliance and multi-facetedness.

James Sim is a character unlike any other I've encountered. He's also similar to many others in that the harder he tries to solve the situation confronting him, the further he falls into the hole, like Alice in Wonderland.

I've attempted to describe this novel to friends, customers and colleagues in the following ways: real, surreal, Kafkaesque, a spy novel, a love story, a puzzle. It is all and none of these things. It is itself and itself alone.

I could describe the rest of the amazing cast of this gorgeous, reverberant novel, but all I'll say is: please, please do yourself a favor and read it."
--Carl Hoffman, Bayview


"Immediately steeped in this mind-bending novel, I couldn't stop reading even as the world around me felt more surreal with the turn of each page. I felt pulled with the protagonist from everyday life to find myself at wits' end, faced with treachery, deceit, and anxious anticipation. The day I finished reading the book, I ate a fortune cookie which read, "Every half-truth is a lie"; in that same vein, we find in every lie, a half-truth."
--Wil Tietsort, Shorewood

I've heard nothing but praise about his poetry, too, and it should appeal to fans of Josh Bell and David Berman. Or so I hear.