The Millionaires: A Novel [Hardcover]

Inman Majors (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: January 7, 2009

A brilliant novel of new money and old manners, crossing The Great Gatsby with the spirit of Tom Wolfe.

Meet the Cole brothers, charismatic country boys with more money than God—half moonshine and half martini. Roland, the younger, is running for governor of Tennessee, while J.T. maneuvers to bring a full-fledged world's fair to the small city of Glennville. To the dismay of the old guard, the fair succeeds, making the Coles among the most important men in the state. All that stands between them and grander ambitions is an investigation into how their bank made all that money so damn fast.

Life in the fast lane has taken its toll on the Coles' families; their wives and mistresses are among the sharpest, sassiest creations of recent fiction. The quiet center of the story is Mike Teague, the Coles' advisor, who knows one of those women too well, and also where all the bodies are buried. Here is a portrait, raucous yet nuanced, of what the South has been, and what it will become.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In Majors's (Wonderdog) bloated, frenetic third novel, two young East Tennessee brothers born into extreme wealth struggle to keep their secrets under wraps. J.T. Cole, a fast-driving banker, wants to put Glennville, Tenn., on the map by having the city host a world expo, while his younger and more sophisticated banker brother, Roland, has his heart set on running for the coveted governorship. A successful fairground event nets the brothers some serious cash, much to the chagrin of investigators keeping a close eye on the bankers' shady loan practices. For the duration of the novel, both men are consistently unlikable, cheating on their sassy, perceptive, fedup wives and pushing their weight around their respective territories. By the time J.T.'s wife, Corrine, rightfully throws him out, federal agents descend on the thieving bankers, and a plane disaster shakes everyone up, readers will be too exhausted to care. This sprawling effort is a jumble of excessive exposition and sentence fragments that could have been a lively, spirited tale of greed corrupting absolutely. (Jan.)
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Review

Moving from backroom poker games to pols’ hangouts to the governor’s office, this expansive, smoothly flowing novel offers a rich look at family dynamics and overweening ambition. (Booklist )

Majors's depiction of a Tennessee evening is reminiscent of James Agee's hypnotic Knoxville: Summer of 1915. (New York Times Book Review )

The best, most fully accomplished new novel I have read in perhaps three years…a kind of Southern Great Gatsby.
(Alabama Public Radio )

Giving us profilgate bankers who borrow badly, The Millionaires is a timely work.
(Wall Street Journal )

Entertaining and thought-provoking…It's literature, and serious readers will want to tackle it.
(Baton Rouge Advocate )

Inman Majors has wandered into a wild territory previously wholly owned by Robert Penn Warren and established squatters' rights. (Michael Lewis, author of Moneyball and Liar's Poker )

A knowing social novel, ruthlessly alive. Inman Majors may know everything. (Mark Costello, author of Big If )

Majors's prose often kicks your head back in outright admiration. What a hell of a writer. (Brad Watson, author of The Heaven of Mercury )

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 480 pages
• Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company; 1 edition (January 7, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0393068021
• ISBN-13: 978-0393068023
• Product Dimensions: 9.4 x 6.6 x 1.3 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.7 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (43 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,297,711 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Must Read Novel about brothers, politics, power and the South, January 21, 2009

By 

Johhny B2 (Georgia) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Millionaires: A Novel (Hardcover)

Simply put, this is a brilliant new novel from Inman Majors (Swimming in Sky, Wonderdog). Being a life long southerner myself, it is clear that Majors understands how and why this region changed better than anyone I have read since Faulkner. The novel explores man's most dangerous enemies-greed and ambition- while offering a look at the changing south and all its complexities. The Teague character is especially fascinating in how real he is- not all virtuous, not entirely corrupt. This timely work combines the drama of sibling relationships, politics and power to create a poignant glimpse at the changing south in the late 1970's and early 1980's. It is the best novel I have read in a long time.

7 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Wish there were a 4.75 star rating, January 7, 2009

By 

Holly Kincaid "Book addict" (Indiana, USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Millionaires: A Novel (Hardcover)

(What's this?)

There is much to like about this book. I won't go into the story line, but will spend a bit of time on the writing and my reaction to the story.

This is very close to a 5 star book for me. It took awhile to get into since the writing style is very different. There are no quotation marks and many liberties are taken with punctuation in general. It was distracting at first, but fairly quickly I got in the flow and found it to be fine. This is also not written like a "normal" novel in other ways. Each chapter may have a completely unique stye. One of the formats is that of a script including lighting instructions, etc. Another of the formats is a snapshot of different conversations going on -- particularly a group of conversations prior to a football game with each person's monologue as a subset. Again, I found this a bit jarring at first but found I really enjoyed it as the book moved along because it was such a fresh approach and made it really stand out from other books I have read lately.

The only reason I didn't give it a 5 star rating was that there is some over-use of particular, unusual words that I noticed enough that it disrupted the flow for me. Minor, but still a flaw.

Overall, the book is outstanding and the writing is great. There were some great passages in the book where I found myself saying "that's a perfect description" of something --- those are the books that rise to the top for me. Something I had taken for granted and not paid attention to was pointed out in the book and I appreciated the author's observation skills and ability to make whatever it was come alive.

Great book -- settle in for a great read !

6 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Beautifully Crafted, Complex Novel..., December 11, 2008

By 

delicateflower152 (Texas) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: The Millionaires: A Novel (Hardcover)

(What's this?)

Inman Majors is a skilled wordsmith; his dialog and syntax are spot-on with respect to the region and characters about whom he is writing. His descriptions are beautifully woven word pictures; extremely well done so the reader feels a part of the scenes. The chapter titled "Teague in the Country" - page 306 in the advanced reader's copy - is pure poetry.

That being said, it took me about half the novel to become entirely engrossed in the story. Major's writing style took some getting used to and, although I ended up really enjoying the book, I was initially put off by the novel's format.

While the promo's indicate this is a book about the Cole Brothers, I found the story to be more focused on Mike Teague and the Cole wives. Teague is the strong, silent type. As the lobbyist working for the Cole brothers, he is ensnared in a web of deceite and nearly ruined. Only his inherent honesty, valued by the men who have none, ends up saving him. The Cole women are "steel magnolias," putting up with the foibles of their men, but ultimately surviving and thriving. One has "married up" and one has "married down", but both are interesting characters. Their one weakness is putting up with the brothers' infidelities.

This is a beautifully written, complex novel that is not to be read when distracted. The story is involved enough to require the reader's attention and blocks of uninterrupted time in which to read. I definitely enjoyed the book more when I devoted time to its reading, rather than trying to catch a page here or there. Not a book for the doctor's office or the airport.