The Minotaur Takes a Cigarette Break
A Novel
Download image
ISBN10: 0312308922
ISBN13: 9780312308926
Trade Paperback
320 Pages
$23.00
CA$24.99
In this debut novel, Steven Sherrill follows the Minotaur—a mythological creature with the body of a man and the head of a bull—through two weeks of his life as a cook at a steakhouse in the contemporary American South. Once a devourer of virgins and lads, time and circumstances have diminished his power considerably.
Through the Minotaur's experiences, Sherrill spotlights the alienation and loneliness that are part of our society. During the two-week period we follow the Minotaur, we meet memorable characters along the way from his co-workers at the restaurant to his neighbors at the trailer park. Sherrill also manages to make mundane doings—kitchen work, car repair, personal grooming—interesting and even exciting at times. By the end of the novel, the reader is pulling for the Minotaur to find the brief moment of happiness that he has sought for so many centuries.
Reviews
Praise for The Minotaur Takes a Cigarette Break
"As revisionist mythology, Sherrill's novel is darkly intelligent and sometimes dazzling. [His] Minotaur is a complex and sympathetic creation, conspicuous yet socially invisible. What's more, he's here to stay."—Atlanta Journal-Constitution
"One of our most original and oddly moving novels in some time . . . funny, touching, haunting . . . If you don't fall under the spell of Sherrill's Minotaur, so human in his needs and longings, you probably should be tossed in the labyrinth yourself."—The Charlotte Observer
"A comic, bittersweet first novel . . . [Sherrill] reveals himself as that most endangered of literary species, a crafty, talented novelist who's not afraid to show his heart."—Chicago Tribune
"[Sherrill] can make images luminesce with the reflected light of language."—San Diego Union-Tribune
"Brilliant imagination . . . Every page is a delight worth savoring for a millennium or two."—USA Today