Seth is a junior copywriter whose latest tagline just went viral. But while he's busy drooling over his future corner office, the walls crumble around him. When his job lets him go, he can't let go of his job. Thankfully, one former colleague can't let him go either: Robert "Moon" McCloone, a skeezy on-the-rise exec better suited to a frat house than a boardroom.
Purkert’s tweak to the man-child-in-crisis comic novel, as the title suggests, is that he’s ultimately less willing to forgive his hero’s blundering and more skeptical about how much men like him can be rehabilitated ... The novel waffles somewhat in figuring out how funny it wants to be ... But Roth and Bellow rambled, too, understanding that young, callow men tend to bump into a lot of walls in the maze of early adulthood.
Poet Purkert’s debut novel brings quite a few ideas to the table... but it’s the flash and sizzle of his wit that really deliver this bleak cautionary tale ... Ironic, plangent, gritty, and, ultimately, spiritual.
A smart satire ... Like its protagonist, Purkert’s freewheeling narrative sometimes feels unsteady in its direction, but the finely wrought prose and spot-on descriptions are undeniable.
