Overview

The year is 1990 and the place is a slightly altered Cleveland, Ohio, which sits on the edge of a suburban wasteland-the Great Ohio Desert. Lenore Stonecipher Beadsman has a few problems: her great-grandmother has disappeared with twenty-five other inmates of the Shaker Heights Nursing Home. Her beau (and boss), editor-in-chief Rick Vigorous, is insanely jealous. And her cockatiel, Vlad the Impaler, has started spouting a mixture of psychobabble, Auden, and the King James Bible, which may propel him to stardom on a Christian fundamentalist television program.

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9781607885399

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Reviews

Robert Petkoff presides with gusto over this alternative slice of Americana, and he does so with a bevy of character voices, subtle asides, and a style that captures one's attention from the book's first word. He has an energetic rhythm that moves the story along and keeps one engaged when the action moves back and forth in time. Petkoff also does a wonderful job with the author's rich language by highlighting key words and allowing them to linger before he moves on to the next idea. -- AudioFile Remarkable...hip but true. -- New York Times Book Review Petkoff's narration is energetic, compelling, and well-paced. He deftly handles Wallace's linguistic gymnastics and entertains with brutally sharp comedic timing. Listeners will particularly appreciate the range of zany and pitch perfect voices Petkoff lends to Wallace's equally kooky cast of characters. Fun, funny, and very highly recommended. -- Publishers Weekly (starred review) Wonderful...outlandish....The Broom of the System stands apart from the pack. Offbeat and inventive, it's filled with some of the most deadly accurate contemporary dialogue ever captured in print....You're in for a good time. -- Cleveland Plain Dealer Gut-splitting laughs...runs the gamut from sex to TV preachers, from Gilligan's Island to Wittgensteinian philosophy....Beneath the poetry, beneath the bubbling humor, something sinister is cooking. Wallace has something to say about society, something heedful. -- Philadelphia Inquirer Daring, hilarious...a zany picaresque adventure of a contemporary America run amok. -- New York Times

Daring, hilarious...a zany picaresque adventure of a contemporary America run amok. -- New York Times Gut-splitting laughs...runs the gamut from sex to TV preachers, from Gilligan's Island to Wittgensteinian philosophy....Beneath the poetry, beneath the bubbling humor, something sinister is cooking. Wallace has something to say about society, something heedful. -- Philadelphia Inquirer Petkoff's narration is energetic, compelling, and well-paced. He deftly handles Wallace's linguistic gymnastics and entertains with brutally sharp comedic timing. Listeners will particularly appreciate the range of zany and pitch perfect voices Petkoff lends to Wallace's equally kooky cast of characters. Fun, funny, and very highly recommended. -- Publishers Weekly (starred review) Remarkable...hip but true. -- New York Times Book Review Robert Petkoff presides with gusto over this alternative slice of Americana, and he does so with a bevy of character voices, subtle asides, and a style that captures one's attention from the book's first word. He has an energetic rhythm that moves the story along and keeps one engaged when the action moves back and forth in time. Petkoff also does a wonderful job with the author's rich language by highlighting key words and allowing them to linger before he moves on to the next idea. -- AudioFile Wonderful...outlandish....The Broom of the System stands apart from the pack. Offbeat and inventive, it's filled with some of the most deadly accurate contemporary dialogue ever captured in print....You're in for a good time. -- Cleveland Plain Dealer

Author Information

David Foster Wallace (1962-2008) was the New York Times bestselling author of Infinite Jest, The Broom of the System, and Girl with Curious Hair. His essays and stories have appeared in Harper's, the New Yorker, Playboy, Paris Review, Conjunctions, Premiere, Tennis, the Missouri Review, and the Review of Contemporary Fiction. He received numerous awards, including the Whiting Award, the Lannan Award for Fiction, the QPB Joe Savago New Voices Award, and the O. Henry Award. Robert Petkoff is an actor and audiobook narrator who has won a prestigious Audie Award and multiple AudioFile Earphones Awards. He has appeared on Chappelle's Show, Law & Order, and Quantum Leap. His Broadway credits include Sir Robin in Spamalot, Perchik in Fiddler on the Roof, and Tateh in Ragtime.

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