There’s an intimacy to Jason Mott’s fiction, retained even when the scope of his narrative widens. But even by these standards, his fourth novel is a uniquely tight, personal story that digs into deeply emotional territory. Through two interwoven storylines unfolding in a witty, often devastatingly incisive style, Hell of a Book is a journey into the heart of a very particular American experience, one that far too many don’t live to tell ... You may think you see where these two stories are headed, where they will converge and knit together, and what they will have to say at the end, but you don’t. And even if you could, Mott’s bittersweet, remarkably nimble novel would still keep you turning the pages ... a masterwork of balance, as Mott navigates the two narratives and their delicate tonal distinctions. A surrealist feast of imagination that’s brimming with very real horrors, frustrations and sorrows, it can break your heart and make you laugh out loud at the same time, often on the same page. This is an achievement of American fiction that rises to meet this particular moment with charm, wisdom and truth.
... ambitious ... The sands of reality constantly shift under readers' feet as the author feels pressure to ignore his Blackness or speak out about Black issues, receives a visitation from Nicholas Cage and faces the truth about his book's tragic genesis. Mott's unflinching meditation on racism, violence and navigating life as a Black man in America is a surreal and searing triumph
... a novel that confounds the normal parameters of storytelling. What starts out as a relatively straightforward tale about a Black author’s cross-country tour for his novel, also called Hell of a Book, soon meanders into a broader meditation on imaginary friends, mental illness, alcoholism and deep, deep grief. As soon as you think you know where the story is going, the lines between reality and imagination blur, thanks to an unnamed narrator who is unreliable and not entirely likable ... There is a sense of calm in Soot’s story that is in direct and jarring contrast with our narrator’s tell-all. The author’s language is abrasive and assertive, sometimes directly addressing the reader ... the beauty of the novel is in the cracks that distort the plot.
In his fourth novel, which veers from skewering satire to unspeakable sorrow, Mott dangles his readers over a precipice of uncertainty. Is the Writer’s book meant only to absolve white readers of their complicity? Maddening, disorienting, and illuminating.
Dedicated to 'Mad Kids,' Hell of a Book sometimes has the feel of a Young Adult novel gone rogue ... All this possibly autofictional, probably unreliable, and definitely postmodern gamesmanship, Mott’s 'now you see me, now you don’t' act, has the unfortunate effect of making the author’s—and Mott’s – response to violence against Blacks more important than the violence itself ... Mott’s choice of that sensibility makes Hell of a Book a work of sentimentalism in which the emotional responses described and elicited exceed the stimuli. The novel overflows with feeling—the pain of the author’s early life, the suffering of his success, his belated anger about Black lives in general. But given the author’s 'condition,' it’s difficult to trust his passions ... A large part of Hell of a Book satirizes the book tour from hell ... Mott may intend to support the Black Lives Matter movement, but the detailed tour narrative within Hell of a Book is an audience-pleasing, commercial story from which an engaged political novel unsuccessfully struggles to emerge ... Is it possible that Hell of a Book is a parody—like Everett’s 'My Pafology' – of just the kind of sentiment-exploiting novel it seems to be? Or maybe an attack by Mott on Black writers who have come belatedly to writing about systemic racism? ... Because Hell of a Book is far removed from the art of these recent winners, giving Mott’s novel the award seems a travesty.
... stunning ... The author’s sobering recollections of his youth are punctuated with humorous and insightful encounters that include a discussion on national sociopolitical identity with Nicolas Cage and an improbable first date with a funeral director. Mott’s poetic, cinematic novel tackles what it means to live in a country where Black people perpetually 'live lives under the hanging sword of fear.' Absurdist metafiction doesn’t get much better.
... a profound exploration of love, friendship, and racial violence in America ... As chapters alternate between the author’s and Soot’s perspectives, their narratives slowly begin to merge, unfolding into a story that is at once a paean to familial love and friendship and a reckoning with racism and police violence ... By turns playful and surprising and intimate, a moving meditation on being Black in America.
