You might say that Warren Spooner, the title character of Pete Dexter's novel, is jinxed from birth. After a long, difficult delivery in a makeshift room in a Georgia doctor's office, he arrives in the world, but his twin brother dies -- and forever remains his mother's favorite. Spooner's father dies soon thereafter, leaving no imprint on the child's memory. Thereafter, Warren blunders awkwardly and hilariously through entire symphonies of criminal hijinks, somehow never exhausting the patience of his stepfather or our sense of humor. Best of all, National Book Award winner Pete Dexter (Paris Trout; Paper Trails) lets us settle into all these misadventures without squandering our sympathy.
Carolyn See
…here's a novel that's different from anything Dexter has written before…It's new ground and a new tone. Jocose, ironic, even cheery…Dexter seems to look at this life as something of a tall tale, and he's right—there are sentences that don't seem to be exactly his. The book has a Mark Twain feel to it…Not exactly what Pete Dexter usually writes, but madly interesting in what it sets out to do.
—The Washington Post
Liesl Schillinger
Dexter brings Warren Spooner…to life with uncharacteristic expansiveness and tenderness…Spooner has little in common with Dexter's previous work…It's a conversational novel, roving and inclusive, packed with Southern color and Northeastern grit, with rueful reflection and the contretemps of daily life that can't be avoided even on a remote island in the Puget Sound…[Dexter] ended his novel The Paperboy with the words: "There are no intact men." With Spooner, he demonstrates the impulse that keeps writers at their task: the longing to reassemble the whole; to see, however belatedly, who a person was, or could have been.
—The New York Times
Kirkus Reviews
From Dexter (Train, 2003, etc.), a rambling, improvisatory narrative of a not-terribly-compelling life. Warren Spooner arrives in unpromising circumstances, after his mother labored for 53 hours and his "better-looking" twin brother was born dead. On the very same day (Dec. 6, 1956), Congressman Rudolph Toebox coincidentally and conveniently dies, leading to an embarrassing sendoff at sea when his coffin refuses to sink. The two stories cross briefly because the commander in charge of the abortive burial at sea is Calmer Ottosson, who eventually becomes Spooner's stepfather. Throughout the novel, Dexter traces the many stages of Spooner's development. For example, he has to deal with his much more talented step-siblings, like prodigy Darrow (named after the lawyer), who learns both to read and to play chess while practically in the womb. In contrast, Spooner's talent, such as it is, is to piss in people's shoes and to confound the deputy with this anonymous crime. Spooner becomes an indifferent student but, unaccountably, a talented baseball player-until his promise crashes with an injury to his elbow. He then becomes a reporter, again with mixed results. Along the way we witness the uneasy relationship between Calmer, who becomes a teacher when mustered out of the Navy-and later has to investigate a scandal involving remedial students in his school system scoring at the 97th and 98th percentiles on standardized tests-and his stepson, who never experiences much success in anything. Dexter's technique is to roam around his narrative at a leisurely pace, multiplying incidents until the episodic ultimately devolves into the disorganized. And his ham-fisted comic approach involves suchhilarity as the aforementioned shoe-pissing and constantly nudging the reader in the ribs in delight at his own cleverness, coining names such as Dr. C. Elmer Cowhurl and the aforementioned Toebox. Ultimately, and lamentably, we wind up not caring about Spooner's fate.
From the Publisher
Pete Dexter, writing of the part played by love in the exuberant life of his hero, Spooner, and the fatal inevitability of the compromises that make life bearable, has given us a novel of picaresque vitality—outlandish, anecdotal, profuse, funny, profound.—Susanna Moore, author of My Old Sweetheart and In the Cut
"[Dexter's] is a voice like no other, though James Ellroy and Elmore Leonard may be counted among his distant literary cousins...So, this book is different! Not exactly what Pete Dexter usually writes, but madly interesting in what it sets out to do. I freely admit to a bias: As far as I'm concerned, Dexter can do no wrong."—Washington Post
"In his latest book, newspaper columnist turned novelist turned screenwriter Pete Dexter has taken the literary-psychoanalytic bull by the horns and — with characteristic and stylish aplomb — blown smoke in its formidable face. His new novel, Spooner, essentially is an autobiographical roman a clef — not really true, except in its major incidents; not quite wholly fictional, except, of course, where it is. It's a book that probably will perplex — and then delight — Dexter's longtime fans, since it really is a memoir thinly disguised as a novel, and, as such, it's a lot like his life: a big, sprawling mess of a book that's nonetheless nearly always entertaining and, in significant parts, genuinely touching. It's also a wonderful reminder that Dexter's journalistic eye for the tellingly instructive detail, particularly as it evokes character, still is second to none."—Los Angeles Times
"A story about a man's struggle to help his troubled stepson by a novelist who writes about trouble better than most anyone."—USA Today
"Lucky for Dexter, the consequences of the tardy, yet (in his judgment) unfinished release of Warren Spooner's wonderful, terrible life are less fraught, even felicitous.... In some 500 pages, Dexter brings Spooner to life with uncharacteristic expansiveness and tenderness. Spooner is a family epic that digs out the emotions packed in memory's earliest bonds - guilt, resentment, loyalty and love.... In Spooner, he unearths the experiences that underlie this nuanced sensibility, exposing the familial archetypes that shade his characters and directly engaging the potent emotions that emerge obliquely in his other books. It's a conversational novel, roving and inclusive, packed with Southern color and Northeastern grit, with rueful reflection and the contretemps of daily life that can't be avoided even on a remote island in Puget Sound. With Spooner, he demonstrates the impulse that keeps writers at their task; the longing to reassemble the whole; to see, however belatedly, who a person was, or could have been."—New York Times Book Review
"Dexter's crowd-pleasing wiles are razor-sharp in this long-awaited novel, the madcap and touching, assured and (ahem) dexterous story of a very Dexter-like Warren Spooner."—Publisher's Weekkly
New York Times Book Review
"Lucky for Dexter, the consequences of the tardy, yet (in his judgment) unfinished release of Warren Spooner's wonderful, terrible life are less fraught, even felicitous.... In some 500 pages, Dexter brings Spooner to life with uncharacteristic expansiveness and tenderness. Spooner is a family epic that digs out the emotions packed in memory's earliest bonds - guilt, resentment, loyalty and love.... In Spooner, he unearths the experiences that underlie this nuanced sensibility, exposing the familial archetypes that shade his characters and directly engaging the potent emotions that emerge obliquely in his other books. It's a conversational novel, roving and inclusive, packed with Southern color and Northeastern grit, with rueful reflection and the contretemps of daily life that can't be avoided even on a remote island in Puget Sound. With Spooner, he demonstrates the impulse that keeps writers at their task; the longing to reassemble the whole; to see, however belatedly, who a person was, or could have been."
USA Today
"A story about a man's struggle to help his troubled stepson by a novelist who writes about trouble better than most anyone."
Los Angeles Times
"In his latest book, newspaper columnist turned novelist turned screenwriter Pete Dexter has taken the literary-psychoanalytic bull by the horns and -- with characteristic and stylish aplomb -- blown smoke in its formidable face. His new novel, Spooner, essentially is an autobiographical roman a clef -- not really true, except in its major incidents; not quite wholly fictional, except, of course, where it is. It's a book that probably will perplex -- and then delight -- Dexter's longtime fans, since it really is a memoir thinly disguised as a novel, and, as such, it's a lot like his life: a big, sprawling mess of a book that's nonetheless nearly always entertaining and, in significant parts, genuinely touching. It's also a wonderful reminder that Dexter's journalistic eye for the tellingly instructive detail, particularly as it evokes character, still is second to none."
Washington Post
"[Dexter's] is a voice like no other, though James Ellroy and Elmore Leonard may be counted among his distant literary cousins...So, this book is different! Not exactly what Pete Dexter usually writes, but madly interesting in what it sets out to do. I freely admit to a bias: As far as I'm concerned, Dexter can do no wrong."
Susanna Moore
Pete Dexter, writing of the part played by love in the exuberant life of his hero, Spooner, and the fatal inevitability of the compromises that make life bearable, has given us a novel of picaresque vitality--outlandish, anecdotal, profuse, funny, profound.
Publisher's Weekkly
"Dexter's crowd-pleasing wiles are razor-sharp in this long-awaited novel, the madcap and touching, assured and (ahem) dexterous story of a very Dexter-like Warren Spooner."
