Beast

“Beast cements Kingsnorth’s reputation as a furiously gifted writer . . . Like the huge creature that haunts its pages, Beast has an uncanny power . . . With its echoes of Kafka and of dread-filled, myth-driven tales like John Gardner’s Grendel, Kingsnorth’s Beast is as cryptic as it is thrilling.”—The Washington Post

“[Written] with unnerving smoothness and lyricism . . . Defining modernist characters such as Samuel Beckett’s The Unnameable, the chattering brain in a vat, and the self-limning mind of James Joyce’s wanderer Leopold Bloom figure as literary relations of Kingsnorth’s Buckmaster . . . Beast is a cautionary fable for everyone who might hope to evade our current historical impasse by sheer bad faith or by extremes of primitivism, self-seeking or abstraction. It leads readers away from optimism and realism alike, deeper into a new scrutiny of the stories by which we try to make our way.”—San Francisco Chronicle

“On its own, [Beast] is a taut, thrilling and mystifying narrative. Taken in tandem with The Wake, it forms a powerful meditation onviolence, society and the nature of exile. Kingsnorth’s novel is relentless and philosophical, and this uneasy pairing gives it anabundance of raw power.”— Minneapolis Star Tribune

“To read Beast is a joy . . . Kingsnorth’s gaze is so intense it forces a similar intensity from the reader . . . In the end, your gaze has become as minutely focused as his hermit’s. You feel alive.”—The Guardian (UK)

“A tour de force, reminiscent of the best of John Fowles and David Mitchell.”—Kirkus Reviews (starred review)