Pieces of Payne

By Albert Goldbarth

Book Overview

Albert Goldbarth is "a dazzling virtuoso who can break your heart" (Joyce Carol Oates)

How is Eliza's divorce connected to the rise of twentieth-century quantum physics? Why does the steamy promise of "a key unlocking a door at a cheap motel along I-35" lead us to a consideration of Moby-Dick? What does one physician's fake appointment book have to do with Columbus, werewolves, and Fanny Burney's famously excruciating nineteenth-century mastectomy? Albert Goldbarth sets his story of love's daily pleasures and griefs upon a foundation of ever-branching footnotes--from the strange worlds of supermarket tabloids and the Legion of Super-Heroes to more contemplative forays into gender politics, Dickens scholarship, and medical anomalies. By taking us on this mind-bending journey, he shows us how our lives are both confused and empowered by the multilayered universe around us.

Pieces of Payne is the first novel by Goldbarth, a two-time winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1555973787
• ISBN13: 9781555973780
• Release Date: April 2003
• Publisher: Graywolf Press
• Length: 208 Pages
• Weight: 0.72 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.3" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

Amazing!

Albert Goldbarth is a gem of a writer. He's mostly a poet, and at times, that's very obvious in this novel. His use of language and imagery is bizarre at times, but always beautiful. Pieces of Payne is an interestingly formed novel. It's full of tangents and footnotes... which creates a very different sort of reading experience. If you love Goldbarth's poetry, I highly recommend this book. If you haven't had a taste of Goldbarth yet, I'd recommend starting with Budget Travel through Space and Time: Poems and then you can really appreciate the power of Pieces of Payne.