The Financial Lives of the Poets
Books | Fiction / Absurdist
3.5
Jess Walter
“Darkly funny, surprisingly tender . . . witheringly dead-on.” — Los Angeles TimesNamed one of the year’s best novels by: Time • Salon.com • Los Angeles Times • NPR/Fresh Air • New West • Kansas City Star • St. Louis Post-DispatchA comic and heartfelt novel from the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Beautiful Ruins and Cold Millions about how we get to the edge of ruin—and how we begin to make our way back.What happens when small-time reporter Matthew Prior quits his job to gamble everything on a quixotic notion: a Web site devoted to financial journalism in the form of blank verse?Before long, he wakes up to find himself jobless, hobbled with debt, spying on his wife's online flirtation, and six days away from losing his home. . . . Until, one night on a desperate two a.m. run to 7-Eleven, he falls in with some local stoners, and they end up hatching the biggest—and most misbegotten—plan yet.
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Author
Jess Walter
Pages
320
Publisher
Harper Collins
Published Date
2009-09-22
ISBN
006196591X 9780061965913
Community ReviewsSee all
"What can be more poetic than economics? Capitalist economics determine who lives and who dies, how one lives, what we do with our lives. You can tell what someone’s life looks like by a glance at a checkbook ledger or credit score. Economics is the thread that creates the fabric of our society. The base of every war and prejudice. The cause of racism, sexism, and religious discrimination (though they frame economics as the side effect). We are the ants and money is the sand, the food — what else matters in an ant farm?<br/><br/>The Financial Life of Poets brilliantly describes the 2008 Financial Crisis (to someone who lived through it but didn’t really understand it). The more complicated and strung out money is, the more exploitative. And brilliantly, the nationwide legalization of weed probably could’ve helped dig us out of that mess sooner. <br/><br/>Although not as Marxist as I may wish, the novel toes a brilliant cusp — the Jones’s don’t exist, only marketing that filters out to creditors and debt collectors.<br/><br/>And it feels like we’re back where we were in 2008 now in 2020/2021… ominous, but at least we can give it a bit of a laugh!"
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Abigail Spradlin
"This book was so much fun. I loved reading it and thinking about where the character might be in Spokane, WA. It's never said where the story takes place, but I prefer to think I know. The story is fast paced, and not what I was expecting at all. It's funny and endearing. Read the first scene and it will be a great indicator of how the book will go. <br/><br/>Combined with how much I enjoyed Beautiful Ruins, and JW being a Spokanite, I need to read more of Jess Walter."
Andrew Greene