SHORTLISTED FOR THE MAN BOOKER PRIZE 2008
A Fraction of the whole
by Steve Tolz
“A Fraction of the Whole is that rarest of long books–utterly worth it…The story starts in a prison riot and ends on a plane, and there is not one forgettable episode in between…It reads like Mark Twain with access to an intercontinental Airbus…This book moves; it bucks and rocks in a world that feels more than a hemisphere away…So comically dark and inviting that you have no choice but to step into its icy wake.” —Esquire
“Rollicking…laugh-out-loud funny.” —Entertainment Weekly
“A rich father-and-son story packed with incident, humor, and characters reminiscent of the styles of Charles Dickens and John Irving…Occasionally, a big, sprawling first novel fights its way into print with a flourish, at which point its ambition and the eccentricities of its ‘firstness’ can become its best marketing tools. Such is the case with A Fraction of the Whole, a book that is willfully misanthropic and very funny…like Irving, Toltz makes minor characters leap off the page…He’s a superb, disturbing phrasemaker…this long novel, which lives or dies in the brilliance of its writing, has a subtle, compelling structure
…A Fraction of the Whole soars like a rocket.” —Los Angeles Times
“Combines the hilarious high-low reference points of early Martin Amis with the annihilating punk inventiveness of Chuck Palahniuk.” —Best Life