SERGIO DE LA PAVA is the author of A Naked Singularity and Personae. He is a public defender in New York City.
“De la Pava . . . can seem like an avenging angel, at least for
those with a certain view of what ails contemporary American
literature . . . . Hilariously profane . . . . Thrilling . . . .
Colloquial in tempo yet nerdy in content, divinely detached yet
intimately casual in tone, impossibly learned and improvisational
at the same time . . . . There are, to be sure, trace elements
in Lost Empress of David Foster Wallace and William
Gaddis and other postmodern giants. What’s unusual—electrifyingly
so—is to see this kind of polyphonic, self-conscious literary
performance and all-stops-pulled-out postmodernist production value
brought to bear on underclass lives, and on questions of social
justice that tend not to penetrate the soundproofing of the ivory
tower.”
—The New Yorker
“The book oscillates between hilarious surrealism and shocking
reality. As in his first novel, A Naked Singularity, Mr de la Pava
(a public defender) deploys his expertise in a maximalist form
reminiscent of Thomas Pynchon and David Foster Wallace . . . . With
messianic fervour, he conjures up marginalised voices and the
horrors of mass incarceration, against a backbeat of sporting
thrills and that apocalyptic crescendo.”
—The Economist
“In the tradition of maximalists like Thomas Pynchon and William
Gaddis. . . . Half farce, half serious social novel, half
compendium of meditations on everything from Joni Mitchell’s early
albums to the superiority of football’s 4-3 defensive alignment.
That’s three halves, but as with A Naked Singularity, Lost Empress
feels bigger than a single book. . . . It carries the reader into a
teeming, complex world guided by a logic that’s never far removed
from lunacy.”
—The Wall Street Journal
“De la Pava is among the last of a vanishing breed: a
society-spanning novelist of ideas. . . . Lost Empress interrogates
its central subjects—justice, art, poverty—with great urgency.”
—The Nation
“Uproarious. . . . A broad societal farce that bounds from the sky
lounge to the prison yard.”
—The Guardian
“As with the author’s debut novel, A Naked Singularity (2012), the
New York City criminal justice system figures prominently, its
jargon and bureaucratic instruments providing realist texture,
while its absurdities and cruelties fuel the fury that is this
novel’s molten core. Again we witness De La Pava’s gleaming wit,
philosophical benders and popculture fixations, and the sheer
intensity with which he hurls his words in this even more assured
work of incandescent literary maximalism.”
—Booklist (starred review)
“Extraordinary. . . . De la Pava is a maximalist worldbuilder, and
the incredible multiverse he constructs in this book establishes
him as one of the most fearsomely talented American novelists
working today.”
—Publishers Weekly (starred review)
“If Thomas Pynchon and Elmore Leonard had conspired to write North
Dallas Forty, this might be the result: a madcap, football-obsessed
tale of crossed destinies and criminal plots gone awry. . . . [Lost
Empress] is a blast to watch unfold. A whirling vortex of a novel,
confusing, misdirecting, and surprising—and a lot of fun.”
—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
“This multifaceted tour de force. . .waxes both hilarious and
tragic in equal measure as it oscillates among several fascinating
and interrelated characters. . . . Highly recommended.”
—Library Journal (starred review)
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