The Brunist Day of Wrath by Robert Coover

PRAISE FOR THE BRUNIST DAY OF WRATH

“The Brunist Day of Wrath” is, at heart, an indictment of America’s current marriage of religion and politics… The novel’s vast networked vision of the way biblical stories lead us to violence and political subterfuge urgently prods the reader to share Sally’s late recognition that stories are the “most dangerous things there are.” -Stephen Burn, New York Times
 
"Robert Coover’s The Brunist Day of Wrath is a boisterous, bloody, jaw-dropping, awe-inspiring—for any writer, humbling—sometimes painfully, but always expertly, protracted ride… The Brunist Day of Wrath reflects a decade’s worth of labour and attention; it is a book that should, and does, take time to read, a book that, through mysterious means, nonetheless feels pressed on by some urgency. It seems feverish—serious and self-committed—though it is also pun-funny and clever-funny, daffy and delirious. And yet its eye, casting itself around like a billiard ball, picking up small-town grit and gossip, is uneasy, and should be, for it is accountable for its thousand crimes, self-conscious of its own apocalyptic imaginings…" -Natalie Helberg, Numéro Cinq
 
"There is no such thing as the Great American Novel, but this surely is one of them in its scope, sharp-eyed compassion and stripping away of hypocritical posturing. It is massive, mesmerizing, and riveting page by fulsome page, a triumph for Coover and a venomous, virulent, heartfelt vision for all of us." -Sam Coale, Providence Journal
 
"The writing itself is the main attraction of Coover's beastly new novel–vivid, specific, evocative, and fiercely intelligent… Challenging and impressive, a virtuoso work…" -Publishers Weekly
 
"As well as a scathing critique of Christian fundamentalism, this is a story about stories. Events are seen to morph and solidify in new shapes as they are reprocessed through the lenses of myth and history… Many of Coover’s postmodernist contemporaries address similar narrative concerns, but few are so legitimately funny. His off the wall dialogue and deadpan character sketches will provoke laughter at the most apparently inappropriate situations. Whatever the key to this brand of dark, off-the-wall humour, Coover has it. He had it in 1966, and he still has it now." -Lili ni Dhomhnaill, Tn2
 
“the riskiest novel yet by this long-time provocateur and performer of hat acts…” -Tom LeClair, Barnes & Noble Review
 
"What is really so lovely about the Brunist books is that, in spite of Coover’s signature ironic distance in his writing, the extraordinary breadth and depth of detail, the pitch-perfect naturalism, the rigorous adherence to narrative structure, the endless development of characters and voices, all firmly establish the doubt, in the face of overwhelming Writerly evidence, that myth and tale have in fact stolen the show." -James Tierney, Golden Handcuffs
 
"Coover's prose remains as lively as ever." -Time Out 
 
"The bursts of brilliance, the dark humor, the glorious absurdity, the brave interjections about life, death, and art: these make taking the full journey with Coover very much worth the reader’s time." -Susan K. Perry, Creative Atheist

"What is really so lovely about the Brunist books is that, in spite of Coover’s signature ironic distance in his writing, the extraordinary breadth and depth of detail, the pitch-perfect naturalism, the rigorous adherence to narrative structure, the endless development of characters and voices, all firmly establish the doubt, in the face of overwhelming Writerly evidence, that myth and tale have in fact stolen the show." James Tierney, Golden Handcuffs Review

ABOUT ROBERT COOVER

Robert Coover has published fourteen novels, three books of short fiction, and a collection of plays since The Origin of the Brunists received the William Faulkner Foundation First Novel Award in 1966. His short fiction has appeared in The New Yorker, Harper’s, and Playboy, amongst many other publications. A long-time professor at Brown University, he makes his home Providence, Rhode Island.