{"product_id":"9781937512101","title":"A Questionable Shape","description":"\u003cp\u003e\"The smartest zombie novel since Colson Whitehead's \u003ci\u003eZone One\u003c\/i\u003e.\"\u003cbr\u003e-Ron Charles, \u003ci\u003eThe Washington Post\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"\u003ci\u003eA Questionable Shape\u003c\/i\u003e presents the yang to the yin of Whitehead’s \u003ci\u003eZone One\u003c\/i\u003e, with chess games, a dinner invitation, and even a romantic excursion. Echoes of [Thomas] Bernhard’s hammering circularity and [David Foster] Wallace’s bright mind that can’t stop making connections are both present. The point is where the mind goes, and, in that respect, Sims has his thematic territory down cold.\"\u003cbr\u003e-\u003ci\u003eThe Daily Beast\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"A thinking fan's zombie novel... one that asks the question: Do we lose our humanity when the world starts to crumble?\"\u003cbr\u003e-\u003ci\u003eAtlanta Journal-Constitution\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Yes, it's a zombie novel, but also an emotionally resonant meditation on memory and loss.\"\u003cbr\u003e-\u003ci\u003eSan Francisco Chronicle\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Compressed, copiously footnoted and literary, Bennett Sims' \u003ci\u003eA Questionable Shape\u003c\/i\u003e focuses on a zombie outbreak's effect on a young man and his girlfriend in a single week, in which he and his best friend undertake a quixotic, zombie-strewn search for a missing father.\"\u003cbr\u003e-\u003ci\u003eLos Angeles Times\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Evokes the power of David Foster Wallace with a narrative that's cerebral, strangely beautiful, philosophical, and pretty, well, brilliant.\"\u003cbr\u003e-\u003ci\u003eBustle\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"\u003ci\u003eA Questionable Shape\u003c\/i\u003e is a novel for those who read in order to wake up to life, not escape it, for those who themselves like to explore the frontiers of the unsayable. [\u003ci\u003eA Questionable Shape\u003c\/i\u003e] is more than just a novel. It is literature. It is life.\"\u003cbr\u003e-\u003ci\u003eThe Millions\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Brilliantly sensitive, whip-smart... Sims’ genius lies in how he builds a terrifically engrossing and utterly unique novel, not in spite, but rather because of the familiarity of the material. A book that is just as touching and funny as it is riotously smart.\"\u003cbr\u003e-\u003ci\u003eThe Rumpus\u003c\/i\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\"Bennett Sims is a writer fearsomely equipped with an intellectual and linguistic range to rival a young Nabokov's, Nicholson Baker's gift for miniaturistic intaglio, and an arsenal of virtuosities entirely his own. \u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eA Questionable Shape\u003c\/i\u003e announces a literary talent of genre-wrecking brilliance\u003c\/b\u003e.\"\u003cbr\u003e-Wells Tower\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cp\u003eMazoch discovers an unreturned movie sleeve, a smashed window, and a pool of blood in his father's house; the man has gone missing. So he creates a list of his father's haunts and asks Vermaelen to help track him down.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eHowever, hurricane season looms over Baton Rouge, threatening to wipe out any undead not already contained, and eliminate all hope of ever finding Mazoch's father.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eBennett Sims turns typical zombie fare on its head to deliver a wise and philosophical rumination on the nature of memory and loss.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eBennett Sims\u003c\/b\u003e was born and raised in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. His fiction has appeared in \u003ci\u003eA Public Space\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eTin House\u003c\/i\u003e, and \u003ci\u003eZoetrope: All-Story\u003c\/i\u003e. A graduate of the Iowa Writers' Workshop, he currently teaches at the University of Iowa, where he is the Provost Postgraduate Visiting Writer in fiction.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Two Dollar Radio","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47167262458096,"sku":"9781937512101","price":16.5,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0737\/7593\/9824\/files\/9781937512101_p0.jpg?v=1769897936","url":"https:\/\/shop-qa.barnesandnoble.com\/products\/9781937512101","provider":"Barnes \u0026 Noble (DEV)","version":"1.0","type":"link"}