Mission to America

Zusatztext “An insightful and drolly funny tale that skewers and celebrates contemporary American life.” – San Francisco Chronicle “Mark Twain meets Jonathan Franzen in Mission to America ! Walter Kirn’s dark! funny road novel.” – Maxim "Hilarious. . . . Kirn doesn't miss a chance to skewer consumerism! New Ageism! and ski-town magnates. The barbs are spot-on and the apostles! with their naivet? about everything from Cheetos and Wiccans to reality TV! are hopelessly endearing." – People "Kirn's fourth novel is his most ambitious. . . . A tour de force." – The New York Times Book Review “Thank goodness that Walter Kirn! one of the nation’s best satirists! has made a funny! wise little novel. . . . A sly! tender! witty! probing of the nature of religious conviction.” – The Plain Dealer Informationen zum Autor Walter Kirn is a contributing editor to Time and GQ and a regular reviewer for The New York Times Book Review . His work has appeared in The New York Times Magazine , Vogue , New York , and Esquire . He is the author of four previous works of fiction: My Hard Bargain: Stories , She Needed Me , Thumbsucker , and Up in the Air . He lives in Livingston, Montana. Klappentext Mason LaVerle is a young man on a mission--a mission to America. He was raised in a remote Montana town in the church of the Aboriginal Risen Apostles! a matriarchal! almost New Age-ish sect that! like the Amish! keeps a wary distance from mainstream life. But the Apostles face a dwindling membership! so Mason is sent on an outreach mission with another young man to bring back converts--and more specifically! brides. And so these two naive believers head off in a van to encounter the contemporary scene in all its bewildering! seductive diversity. They prosyletize at malls! passing out leaflets in parking garages based on the condition of the cars and their bumper stickers. Eventually! they make their way to a gilded Colorado ski town! where! while promoting their un-American message of humble! serene! optimistic fatalism! Mason finds himself courting a young woman who used to pose for Internet porn sites! and his partner becomes the live-in guru of a guilt-ridden billionaire with chronic bowel complaints. Meanwhile! back in Montana! the Apostles are facing schism and extinction as their beloved leader! the Seeress! drifts toward death. The mounting pressures lead Mason to the brink of missionary madness. Walter Kirn is one of the most acute observers of contemporary American life that we have. In "Mission to America! he harnesses that gift to a satirical yet moving tale of a stranger in a strange land that just happens to be our own. Leseprobe ONE Partly we did it out of pity. We  felt sorry for  people who didn't know what we knew. By reading their newspapers in our village library and questioning the occasional lost hiker or adventurous dirt-road motorist, we realized as never before that life out there had become strident, disheartening and harsh while life back here, back home in Bluff, Montana, remained harmonious and sweet. But we also had selfish reasons for what we did. Over the years we'd come to understand that there was something we needed from the outsiders, without which our charmed little world might not survive. We needed new blood. We needed wives and mothers. We needed a few brown eyes among our offspring, more dark curly hair, and less inherited color blindness. We needed to stir our lumpy hard old stock until it was soft enough to pour again. And so, for the first time since we came together one hundred and forty-seven-years earlier, and in violation of our traditions of silence, modesty, and isolation, we gathered a party to go down out of the hills and mount, at long last, a mission to America. The strange disturbed place needed help, and so did we. Ou...

Product details

• Authors: Walter Kirn
• Publisher: Anchor Books USA
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Released: 10.10.2006
• EAN: 9781400031016
• ISBN: 978-1-4000-3101-6
• No. of pages: 288
• Dimensions: 133 mm x 202 mm x 17 mm
• Subject: Fiction > Narrative literature