Comment

Sep 02, 2014pugterranian rated this title 5 out of 5 stars
Ferris’s second novel has been unfavorably reviewed by some critics (and an ax-grinding Jay McInerney) and they have a fair point: The Unnamed is a far cry from Ferris’s acclaimed debut, the comical Then We Came to the End. Reminiscent of Beckett, Faulkner and Cormac McCarthy’s The Road, The Unnamed is heart-breaking parable, wonderfully strange, brilliant, spellbinding and moving. It is an illumination of the mentally ill mind and a debate on the necessity of religion. It is an examination of a couple’s cycle of abandonment and commitment to each other. Throw in some devilishly neat twists and tricks and a pinch of good old postmodern suburban American angst and you have an existential page-turner that I found deeply satisfying.