Boonville: A Novel [Paperback]

Robert Mailer Anderson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 7, 2003

Surrounded by misfits, rednecks, and counterculture burnouts, John Gibson -- the reluctant heir of an alcoholic grandmother -- and Sarah McKay -- a commune-reared "hippie-by-association" -- search for self and community in the hole-of-a-town Boonville. As they try to assemble from the late-twentieth-century jumble of life the facts of sexuality, love, and death, and face the possibility of an existence without God, John and Sarah learn what happens when they dare to try to make art from their lives.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

An eclectic knot of hippies, rednecks, marijuana growers, assorted eccentrics and Miami expatriates inhabit the California town of Boonville, pop. 715. Anderson's debut novel is a jolting journey among these misfits, occasionally witty and insightful but more often rambling, losing its way amid too many disparate pop culture references and unwieldy attempts at edgy prose ("Outside the apartment, Florida air hung as hot and tight as a sunbather's butt thong"). John Gibson leaves an empty life in sunny Miami after a tussle with his girlfriend and heads west to the house his grandmother bequeathed him in Boonville. Upon arriving, he immediately runs afoul of the locals, an odd mixture of inbred hill people and various contingents of hippies, including leftovers from the 1960s and a more contemporary crop. He's relieved when he meets commune-raised Sarah McKay, with whom he feels a connection, probably because she's remotely normal and beautiful. Sarah has her own set of issues to plow through, however, which she does in interminable fashion. The plot hinges on John's attempts to escape beatings by Sarah's ex-husband, a violence-prone redneck, and his interaction with the denizens of Boonville. Characters like the grossly fat Pensive Prairie Sunset, a counterculture holdout who spouts hackneyed lines about male patriarchy and Eastern religion, fall flat. The narrative relies so heavily on the far-out and fantastical that when it attempts to ground itself in human feeling, it scrambles for solid footing. In the end, Boonville is just another place where dreams stagnate.
Copyright 2002 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

"...a great first novel...(Anderson) has a language and style all his own...bracingly fresh...uproarious." -- San Francisco Chronicle, November 11, 2001

"...the funniest (debut novel) since Philip Roth's Goodbye, Columbus...very, very funny...Anderson may be the WASP Lenny Bruce." -- Anderson Valley Advertiser November 21, 2001

"A sardonic and beautifully imagined first novel...pages of well-tuned humor...distinguished by an exemplary eye for emotional detail." -- SF Weekly, October 31-November 6, 2001 --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 272 pages
• Publisher: Harper Perennial; First Edition first Printing edition (January 7, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060516216
• ISBN-13: 978-0060516215
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.3 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (24 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #194,877 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars I can see my house from here!, March 12, 2002

By 

Monte Williams - See all my reviews

This review is from: Boonville (Hardcover)

(From my Zentertainment.com review):

That the strange little town of Boonville, California is an obscure target makes it no less an easy one.

And if I told you that the first word in the novel is "Boonville" and the last is "Yee-haw," you might fairly assume that Robert Mailer Anderson lets the obvious gags write themselves and adds nothing worth a second look.

Not at all. I have lived in Boonville for just over a year now myself, and in fact I only read Anderson's novel for that sad little "I can see my house from here!" thrill, but if anything, the familiar setting proved to be a mild distraction from what is otherwise a hilarious and morbidly charming book.

John Gibson inherits a cabin and a demented legacy from his grandmother and reluctantly travels from Florida to California, leaving his girlfriend of several years in the process. He arrives in town on page 11, and by page 72 he has already decided, "F**k it... F**k it all. F**k being hung over and getting beat up... Most of all, f**k Boonville."

But he doesn't quite manage to get out, and soon he meets Sarah McKay, a young "hippie by association" who is more ambitious and self-aware than her fellow dropouts at the Waterfall commune, and thus inevitably more bitter, as well. She and John share a distracted but very real attraction and interest in one another, but little comes of it in any traditional or predictable sense due to an unlikely series of obstacles, ranging from naked hippies grunting menacingly on all fours to violent rednecks whose idea of reconstructive surgery is super-glue to reattach a chopped lip.

Anderson provides (pop) cultural context without resorting to the simple name dropping of lesser writers. He is also refreshingly unconcerned with political correctness. However, he abandons it not for the sake of mean jokes, but keen insights. He is a writer of absolutely vicious humor, and yet Boonville is satisfying not because it causes the reader to wince at its merciless jokes (though it certainly does), but because on the same page that makes you cringe, you're also likely to nod your head at an unfortunate but familiar bit of dysfunction or even smile at an unexpected display of heart.

If Tom Robbins was as angry as he is surreal, he might have written Boonville. Instead, it was left to Robert Mailer Anderson, which is perhaps a mixed blessing for the people of Boonville, but great news for readers everywhere else.

13 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Funny, poignant, and funny again!, December 6, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: Boonville (Hardcover)

Boonville is like Carl Hiaasen crossed with Updike's Rabbit stories. Hilarious! A page turner. Energy in each sentence. Dark in it's humor, the funniest passages ring absolutely true, dealing with the human condition and the big question of why we exist. I can't remember a better first novel, maybe Portnoy's Complaint by Philip Roth.

7 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A visit home...., August 12, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Boonville: A Novel (Paperback)

I bought this book in San Francisco on the way to visit the Mendocino Coast. I grew up in a small town ( We played Boonville in basketball)in the area and found this book to be a hoot and a fairly accurate portrayal of small town life in Northern California. From the "hip" alternative culture that can safely hide in a small town to the more established residents who have been there for generations, this brought a feeling of Deja vu to me. I am one of those who "escaped" and enjoyed the trip back, probably because it has been many years and was certainly temporary! Also enjoyed to references to small towns in the area, including my own, which I have never seen in print before. It is clear that the author has spent his time in Boonville. I enjoyed this book a lot.