The Suitors

By Ben Ehrenreich

Book Overview

Very loosely based on The Odyssey, this wildly inventive, skillfully crafted novel follows the eyebrow-raising exploits of one woman's much-maligned, ill-fated suitors.

While the Odysseus character (herein named Payne) gallivants around, waging war and otherwise taking his time on the voyage home, the Penelope character (now Penny) finds herself surrounded by a motley crew of ne'er-dowells eager for nothing but her attention. She, however, cannot be bothered with anything but her memories of Payne. That is, until the mysterious arrival of a man whose origins no one on the scene can quite divine. When Penny starts taking a shine to him, the tenuous calm on the home front quickly starts to unravel. Full of ideas but with never a dull moment, The Suitors heralds the debut of an exciting new literary voice.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1582433356
• ISBN13: 9781582433356
• Release Date: March 2006
• Publisher: Counterpoint LLC
• Length: 295 Pages
• Weight: 0.94 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.0" x 6.1" x 8.3"

Customer Reviews

An enigma, poetry, and the odyssey rolled into one.

I've been wanting to read this novel since I read a short story by Ehrenreich in McSweeneys about an odd couple meeting in an aquarium in post-apocalyptic Los Angeles. Although it's far from my idea of the perfect novel and I can see how it might be construed as pretentious, I think Ehrenreich has a very unique, and poetic voice. I love the way this book and the short story I read seem to teeter somewhere between a surreal nightmare, a daydream, and everyday reality. It's not for everyone, but if you are looking for something different and you appreciate the craft of writing, it might be just right for you!

Beauty

This is really an extraordinary, beautiful novel. It is not for everyone--it's too smart to be, too strange and strangely wise. I bought this book and half expected it to be some pale shadow of Homer and found instead a whole world, hilarious, sad, absurd. Did I mention beautiful?

Science Fiction

Of all the books I ordered for my son, this was clearly the best written and most interesting conceptually.

The Odyssey Unpantsed

This book is beautiful. A frightfully frank and intimate look at love, lust, literature, language. You can smell sea salt in these pages, and taste the limbs, legumes, frog soup & eel that the protagonists live on. Were they not so wicked and prankish, these characters might overwhelm us with their despair. Were it not so funny and rich, this book might clobber us with sadness. Payne and Penny's mad passions are as palpable as the calf heads that Ehrenreich serves whole and garnished with cock's combs and kidneys. What do I know: I just buy books online. But I'm thrilled to have discovered this one, and I'm thrilled that Counterpoint had the 'sauce tortue' to publish it.

Definitely worth reading

While the plot loosely follows the Odyssey, the book at times reminded me of Orwell's Animal Farm, except it's much less heavy-handed. Ehrenreich displays a sly, acerbic humor and he's wickedly on-target as he mocks nationalism, war, and the human condition. That's what makes this book so good - it's full of unique gems of insight that sparkle throughout. Ehrenreich adeptly mixes humor and sorrow, joy and gloom with a deft touch. An exceptional first novel, and I look forward to more books by this author.