M31: A Family Romance [Paperback]

Stephen Wright (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 9, 2004

Dash and Dot—husband and wife; self-professed descendants of aliens from the M31 galaxy—are the world’s most in-demand lecturers on the UFO circuit. They live in a decommissioned church in the middle of America, with a radar dish on its steeple and a spaceship in the sanctuary. Their children have the run of the house when Dash and Dot are away. When a couple of UFO groupies show up looking for the extraterrestrial duo, they find instead a nuclear family—or rather, a family gone nuclear—whose comically discomforting world resembles our own as much as it does another world altogether.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Dash and Dot, popular fixtures on the seminar and radio call-in show circuits because of their tales of visitations from extraterrestrials from the planet M31, live in an abandoned church somewhere in the Midwest with their extended family and hangers-on. The church steeple has been fitted out with a satellite dish to scan the stars for signs of future arrivals. Into this unusual situation strays Gwen, who believes she was abducted by aliens in a shopping-mall parking lot, and Beale, her traveling partner and sometime boyfriend. Gradually discovering that all is not as it seemsfamilial relationships between the clan members, for example, being particularly cloudythe two ultimately find their own lives at risk as the imbalances slip dangerously out of control. Wright (Meditations in Green) delivers this in fragments, from a variety of viewpoints, leaving the reader appropriately unsettled throughout. Meanwhile, the descriptions etch the particulars of this madness in exceptionally striking detail: the references to a world readers can recognize, seen through the perspective of the fringe-dwelling family, render our world of media and mass culture as alien as the unseen M31. The result is an often harrowing portrait of the chaos that lurks beneath the mundane details of daily life.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Library Journal

Living on the fringes of sanity, wife Dot and husband Dash make their living lecturing on UFOs. The children outdo their parents in weirdness. One daughter is slowly starving her baby by feeding him nothing but diet beverages. Another daughter, hyperactive and emotionally disturbed, has been denied treatment by her father, who believes that her behavior holds the key to communicating with beings from beyond. The drunken son murders a visitor, hiding the body out back so he can study the process of decomposition. This multifaceted story is told in machine gun prose, generously laced with streams of consciousness. The fates of most of the characters are never revealed, but that's often true in life itself. Marcia R. Hoffman, M.L.S., Hoechst Celanese Corp., Somerville, N.J.
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 224 pages
• Publisher: Vintage (March 9, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0375712941
• ISBN-13: 978-0375712944
• Product Dimensions: 5.2 x 0.6 x 8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 8.3 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (3 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,829,730 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

13 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Genius at Work, October 3, 2001

By 

Jordy Mac "Jordy Mac" (Miami, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: M-31 (Paperback)

Stephen Wright is one of the most original and inventive novelists working in the English language. His work is shocking, provocative, astonishingly rich and subtle, and peopled by characters so lifelike you can practically smell them. Wright's imagery borders on the poetic, while his satirical viewpoint is one of unparalleled ferocity and intensity. If you want fiction that changes the way you see the world around you, Stephen Wright is for you.
While M-31 (his second novel, published in 1989) is not quite as bold and polished as Going Native (his third and last to date, published in 1993), it is still the work of an apalling talent. Presently, I am tip-toeing through his debut, Meditations in Green, a booby-trapped novel set largely in the Vietnam war which may well be the best fictional representation of that conflict ever written. But like all his books, it defies genre and easy categorisation.
One day, perhaps, Wright will get the recognition he so richly deserves. Until then, he's the best-kept secret in contemporary literature.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars years ago, but..., April 17, 2008

By 

A NYC Screenwriter (NY, New York United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: M-31 (Paperback)

i read this novel years ago, but the feeling of it still stays with me. i'd read a very favorable review of it in the New York Times Book Review. So, i bought the thing. After four pages, i was convinced that this guy was the worst writer in the history of the planet. On page five, i was convinced that he was one of the best. something just "kicked in for me." in place of fragmented sentences and randomly shifting points of view, there came a highly stylized narrative technique that seemed to have been invented for the sole purpose of telling this bizarre, weird, curiously powerful, and engrossing tale. And, ps. if you want another great book, totally different from M31...I have a recommendation, but it may just be a "guy" book. It's Money, by martin amis. not only is it extremely well-written, but it's THE FUNNIEST BOOK IN THE WORLD. happy reading - david

2 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars incest and ufo's, February 22, 2006

By 

The weird Librarian (KC, MO USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: M31: A Family Romance (Paperback)

Richard Wright is a very talented writer. I would compare him to some of my other favorites like Denis Johnson and Chuck Palanhniuk. This book is probably not his best but due to his excellent writing style its worth a read. I won't give any plot summary other than to say this story follows a husband and wife team of ufologists and their inbreed family. The book loses its focus towards the end and some major plot holes are left unanswered. But if you like any of the afformentioned authors I'd check this book out.