Orrin Porter Rockwell Christianson's genealogy is illustrious and suspicious; his birth is murderous; his survival, miraculous. He grows up with a well-known Mormon Hymn playing constantly in his head, changing lyrics to suit the situation, to guide him, and to encourage him. When he is just seventeen, an angel rescues him from sure death in the desert, and after that, the lyrics of the Hymn focus on his assassinating Spiro Agnew. Orrin struggles to take control of his life--to make his own movie, as we used to say in the Seventies. He does not want to kill Agnew. He wants to marry his Gentile high school sweetheart, Laura.
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Book Description
Editorial Reviews
Review
With a clarity of
language and vision unsurpassed in contemporary American prose,
Steven Janiszewski's Assassination of Spiro Agnew takes
us into a U.S. mazed with madness and Mormonism and all things Utah,
a U.S. that was then and still is. Do we need a novel, even as
brilliant as this one, about a young man on a divine mission to
assassinate the Vice President because he is too liberal? Yes, now
more than ever. Readers, welcome to a masterpiece.
Tom Whalen
tomwhalen.com
Tom Whalen
tomwhalen.com
From the Author
Mitt Romney would not like this book.
It is literary and subtle, and Mitt Romney would not grok its subtlety, but he would not like it on the surface, either.
On the surface, it shows the similarities between Islam and Mormonism, and it tells too much about the secrets of Mormon mind control.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
0 of 1 people found the following review helpful
Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase
I muddled through about 1/4 of the book and quit. I am a "read anything" kind of reader, I found no redeeming qualities about this book..
6 of 11 people found the following review helpful
By Melchizedek
Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase
* Just so you know.... Author Steven Janiszewski's Assassination of Spiro Agnew is a work of metafiction. Metafiction blurs the line between fiction and reality. The author gets involved. He addresses the reader. He's in the novel (look for the grizzly-bear-like hippie thief). Janiszewski births (there are a lot of births in this novel) a lean, dark and handsome assassin named Orrin Porter Rockwell Christianson. He is commanding, all-seeing, awesome in his wrath. A Mormon Hymn plays in his head. Such are the skills of author Janiszewski, the Hymn plays in the reader's head as well. Janiszewski takes us on a hard, dark journey. Men and women are maimed and slaughtered. Birth is bloody. The reader won't soon forget Orrin's grisly birth. Janiszewski, however, can soften, as he meditates on the nature of men and women and love. The Assassination of Spiro Agnew was a gamble. Because of his considerable skills, author Janiszewski brings it off, and brings us a novel as engrossing as it is terrifying.
1 of 3 people found the following review helpful
By Happy
Format:Kindle Edition|Amazon Verified Purchase
I enjoy the novel. It was different then any novel I have read before. I am looking forward to the next novel.
Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
The Assassination of Spiro Agnew is rich, deep literature.
The Assassination of Spiro Agnew is the best novel I have read in a long time. I was stunned the first time I read it. It is not just a novel in form. Read more
Published 8 months ago by Thrice Read
1.0 out of 5 stars
A Bunch of Fiction
This book is a bunch of garbage and the reader should be aware of the fiction nature of this book. It is really a full on bigoted book. I would not recommend this book to anyone.
Published 10 months ago by Disco
More About the Author
Shortly after he was born in 1947, Steven Janiszewski knew that he was a writer. He wrote picture chap books and skits before kindergarten. He wrote short stories and school plays in elementary school. He bought a typewriter in Jr. High so that he could submit his short stories for publication in the real world. In High School, he wrestled and published stories and poems in the school literary zine. He knew that writers didn't have to go to college, citing Hemingway, and he would not have gone, but he graduated high school in 1965, at the peak of the Vietnam Draft.
He graduated the University of Utah, in English, with an emphasis in Creative Writing, under the guidance of the Pulitzer-Prize-winning Quaker poet, Henry Taylor. He published four short stories, a one-act play, and a poem in college literary magazines, and made his first trip to Boulder in 1969 on a Harcourt, Brace Fellowship to the University of Colorado Writers' Conference. He won the Book-of-the-Month Club Fellowship Competition in 1969 and was recruited by major MFA writing programs. Henry Taylor steered him to Hollins College, where he studied with Richard Dillard and Virginia's Poet Laureate, George Garrett.
Four Excepts of his Master's Thesis,"Guacamole Tostada," were published in literary magazines, including "The Transatlantic Review," #51, April, 1975, London. An excerpt of another novel, "Naked Dream," was published in "Lowlands Review," #4, 1977, New Orleans.
He moved to Boulder in June, 1976, to practice Buddhism with Chogyam Trungpa, and after a couple thousand hours of meditation, he lost interest in fiction. He graduated D.U. Law School in December, 1984, and he has practiced law in Denver since May, 1985, specializing in litigation and appeals. From 1986 to 1994, Janiszewski was the Criminal Law Section Editor of "Trial Talk," the monthly publication of the Colorado Trial Lawyer's Association, to which he regularly contributed articles.
On October 1, 1996, Janiszewski was surprised by the Holy Ghost, who wrote, "Jesus is real," among other things. The liberating influence of Christ has allowed Janiszewski to resurrect a novel he wrote back in 1970-1972, to fulfill its purpose today, because he feels like he owes it to someone.
His email address is: steven.janiszewski@gmail.com
He graduated the University of Utah, in English, with an emphasis in Creative Writing, under the guidance of the Pulitzer-Prize-winning Quaker poet, Henry Taylor. He published four short stories, a one-act play, and a poem in college literary magazines, and made his first trip to Boulder in 1969 on a Harcourt, Brace Fellowship to the University of Colorado Writers' Conference. He won the Book-of-the-Month Club Fellowship Competition in 1969 and was recruited by major MFA writing programs. Henry Taylor steered him to Hollins College, where he studied with Richard Dillard and Virginia's Poet Laureate, George Garrett.
Four Excepts of his Master's Thesis,"Guacamole Tostada," were published in literary magazines, including "The Transatlantic Review," #51, April, 1975, London. An excerpt of another novel, "Naked Dream," was published in "Lowlands Review," #4, 1977, New Orleans.
He moved to Boulder in June, 1976, to practice Buddhism with Chogyam Trungpa, and after a couple thousand hours of meditation, he lost interest in fiction. He graduated D.U. Law School in December, 1984, and he has practiced law in Denver since May, 1985, specializing in litigation and appeals. From 1986 to 1994, Janiszewski was the Criminal Law Section Editor of "Trial Talk," the monthly publication of the Colorado Trial Lawyer's Association, to which he regularly contributed articles.
On October 1, 1996, Janiszewski was surprised by the Holy Ghost, who wrote, "Jesus is real," among other things. The liberating influence of Christ has allowed Janiszewski to resurrect a novel he wrote back in 1970-1972, to fulfill its purpose today, because he feels like he owes it to someone.
His email address is: steven.janiszewski@gmail.com
