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by Joshua Furst (Author)
An Austin Chronicle Best Book of the Year
Fred, given name Freedom, is the sole offspring of Lenny Snyder, the infamous pied piper of 1960s counterculture. From a young age, Fred has been exploited by his father and used to enhance Lenny's mystique. Now middle-aged, Fred looks back on life with this charismatic, brilliant, and volatile ringmaster, who is as captivating in these pages as he was to his devoted disciples back then. We see Lenny in his prime and then as he gradually loses his magnetic confidence and leading role at the end of the sixties. Lenny demands loyaty but gives none back in return; he preaches love but treats his family with almost reflexive cruelty. And Fred remembers all of it--the chaos, the spite, the affection. A kaledoscopic saga, this novel is at once a profound allegory for America and a deeply intimate portrait of a father and son.Author Biography
Joshua Furst is the author of the novels Revolutionaries and The Sabotage Café, which was named to the 2007 year-end best-of lists of the Chicago Tribune, the Rocky Mountain News and the Philadelphia City Paper, as well as being awarded the 2008 Grub Street Fiction Prize. His critically acclaimed book of stories, Short People, was published in 2003. His work has appeared in, among other periodicals, Esquire, Salon, The Chicago Tribune, BOMB, and The Forward, where he is a Contributing Editor. His plays include Whimper, Myn and The Ellipse and Other Shapes. He earned his BFA in Dramatic Writing at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts and did graduate work at The University of Iowa Writers' Workshop, from which he received an MFA with Honors in 2001. He lives in New York City, and teaches at Columbia University.
