"A great American novel...a lesson in history...It is the most convincing portrait I know of contemporary America."--James Atlas, "The Atlantic"Russell Banks...explores the themes of good and evil, fate and freedom, success and failure, love and sex, and racism and poverty through alternating chapters focusing on dual protagonists: Bob Dubois, 30, who forsakes his deadend job as an oil-burner repairman in New Hampshire to begin a new life in Florida, and Vanise Dorinsville, a young, illiterate Haitian mother who seeks refuge from poverty by fleeing to America...Original in conception, gripping in execution."--"Newsday"Grandeur...Tremendously ambitious...A powerful, disturbing study in moral 'drift', confusion, and uncertainty."--"San Francisco Examiner-Chronicle"An important novel because of the precise manner in which it reflects the spiritual yearning and materialistic frenzy of our contemporary life...Always, Banks writes with tremendous knowledge, conviction, and authenticity."--"Chicago Tribune
Russell Banks, twice a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, is one of America's most prestigious fiction writers, a past president of the International Parliament of Writers, and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. His work has been translated into twenty languages and has received numerous prizes and awards, including the Common Wealth Award for Literature. He lives in upstate New York and Miami, Florida.