MixedThe New York Times Book ReviewDeprived of the element of surprise, Horrocks instead wrings drama from her method of narration ... Crucially, Louise tells her story in the first person, and Horrocks’s novel is at its most vivid when inhabiting her voice ... Little else in the novel is as enthralling as Louise’s intelligence ... The chapters devoted to Erik are the least psychologically involving; and much of the balance of the novel is concerned with characters who profess ignorance of music in general ... moments of musical insight are far too few. Eager to challenge conventional notions of genius in a society in which men’s talents were nurtured at the expense of women’s, Horrocks is attuned to the possibility that Louise might have made equal or greater contributions to culture if only she’d been given more opportunities and encouragement. But in The Vexations, Louise is effectively sidelined for long stretches, and clever as it is, Horrocks’s belated revelation about why she has structured her novel this way cannot make up for the many pages in which readers have been deprived of its most musical voice.
Nell Fink
RaveThe Guardian...[Zink] takes thrilling narrative shortcuts in order to make space for her characters’ oracular and erudite disquisitions—while also dispensing with many of the supposed requirements of the \'literary novel\'...In the space of a page, Zink readers should expect to learn of a character’s progressive engagement with Dylan Thomas, Prince, and Samuel Beckett. We should also be ready for seemingly important male characters to die off suddenly, with a lack of emotional affect that would likely impress Sartre or Camus...And while Mislaid may claim fewer jokes per page than Zink’s debut...it is the bolder and more memorable fictional creation. The plot’s broad strokes are the stuff of comic opera, updated for the 20th-century American south ... Obviously, the narrative strands are going to collide. Obviously, before that occurs, the book all but taps you on the shoulder to suggest that you might dispute its plausibility ... But it’s precisely by giving readers a new and outlandish tale – one that strays well beyond the borders of so-called \'realism\' – that Mislaid becomes surprisingly affecting ... It would be easy for passages steeped in such knowingness to curdle into a work of literature that’s more grimly impressive than it is joyfully immersive. So it’s a delight to find that, ultimately, the kids of Mislaid come out a little less damaged than their parents. Like Zink’s own writing style, they’re too hip to the sins of the past to fall back on easy political characterizations and assumptions, and too witty to be depressed for very long.
Paul Beatty
RaveThe GuardianBeatty’s wicked wit is the book’s chief source of momentum. And though he avoids the traps of plotless modernism, Beatty’s constant barrage of asides and routines eventually does take precedence over the supreme court plot, for example ... It’s [the] deliberate subversion of harmful cultural assumptions that makes this daring and abrasive novel a joy to read – the furthest thing imaginable from a selling out of anyone.
