Parasites Like Us [Hardcover]

Adam Johnson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: August 14, 2003

Times are changing in South Dakota. Birds are disappearing. Dogs are turning on mankind. Hogs are no more.

Anthropologist Hank Hannah has a hope: that by studying all of the lost civilizations of human history, he may finally come to understand the hearts of those nearest to him. But when one of his students discovers a prehistoric spear point, Hannah abandons his classroom in order to exhume a twelve-thousand-year-old grave, thereby unearthing an ancient and deadly legacy. Now his deep connection with an extinct people must guide him and his companions through an ever more uncertain future, across icy plains haunted by frozen corpses and burning pyres, back twelve thousand years to the dawn of another Ice Age.

Adam Johnson's singular blend of extraordinary compassion, ingenious wit, and athletic prose have earned him comparisons to the likes of Salinger, Vonnegut, and Boyle. His visionary debut novel will not only cement that reputation, but is also certain to attract a variety of readers ranging from fans of Michael Chabon's Wonder Boys to Stephen King's The Stand.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

An archeological find sets off an apocalyptic epidemic in this first novel by Johnson (Emporium), an erratic, overstuffed satire that tracks the antics of a South Dakota academic. Anthropology professor Hank Hannah studies the Clovis people, a prehistoric tribe of hunter-gatherers. His theory is that their hunting habits helped kill off 35 species of large mammals. The discovery of a Clovis arrowhead helps substantiate his claim, but disaster strikes when Hannah and two graduate students, publicity hound Brent Eggers and formidable Trudy Labelle, try to dig up the remains of a Clovis male. The police appear and Hannah is arrested for assaulting the officer who defiles the grave site. His stint at a luxury low-security prison, Club Fed, is interrupted by the outbreak of a deadly epidemic, transmitted from pigs to humans and triggered when Eggers and Labelle use the Clovis arrowhead to kill a pig. The prehistoric contagion litters the Midwest with dead bodies, ushering in a bleak new age. Johnson's fertile imagination produces plenty of innovative speculation about the connection between prehistoric and modern customs, and Hannah's bumbling charm can be endearing. But wading through the chaff of the unfocused narrative-including an ineffective romantic subplot in which Hannah woos a Russian botany professor-is an arduous task. Johnson shows some of the outrageous flair here that made the stories in Emporium a critical success, but his elaborate concoction sags under its own weight.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

As the North American culture ends and the only study is that of humanity, Dr. Hank Hannah, a tenured anthropology professor who's coasting along at the University of Southeastern South Dakota after publishing The Depletionists, about the prehistoric Clovis people, leaves this book as a record for future colleagues. Having contended that the Clovis' sharpened spear points were responsible for eradicating 35 species, Hannah is drawn to the site at which his grad student Eggers finds a Clovis point, and grad student Trudy makes a spear of it. Their testing of the point on a 4-H hog helps land Hannah in a cushy federal prison, leaving the excavation site not properly protected, a situation that soon proves disastrous for all civilization except dogs and a few strangely protected humans. Yet though individuals and species die, the need for human connectedness remains strong. Johnson displays the same inventiveness, black humor, and penetrating insight that marked his short story collection Emporium (2002) in this weird but masterfully written debut novel. Michele Leber
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 352 pages
• Publisher: Viking Adult; 1ST edition (August 14, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0670032352
• ISBN-13: 978-0670032358
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.3 x 1.2 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.6 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (24 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #539,466 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

11 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Dark and clever comedy, November 27, 2003

By 

Eileen Rieback (Coral Springs, FL USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Parasites Like Us (Hardcover)

Hank Hannah is a professor of anthropology, but he is the antithesis of Indiana Jones. He works at a second-rate university, has difficulty gaining credibility among his academic peers, and is unlucky in love. He finally hits pay dirt when a doctoral student he advises unearths the grave of a prehistoric Clovis hunter. Attempting to dig at the site without the appropriate permissions, Hank winds up in a scuffle with the police that lands him in a minimum security prison. In the meanwhile, the dig unleashes a nasty surprise with worldwide repercussions.

There is a lot of dark and outlandish humor here, as first-time novelist Adam Johnson pokes fun at academia and our materialistic society. There are many comic scenes of Hank and his students fumbling their way through their research, of Hank's womanizing, carefree father, and of the cop who likes Pomeranians, hates Hank, and raises his kids in boot-camp fashion. Interspersed with the wry humor, however, is a serious message. There are some powerful descriptions of life after the apocalypse. We are reminded of the gloomy forecast for our future if we repeat the history of our Clovis antecedents by destroying our environment and ourselves with it. We get to view ourselves as a future anthropologist would when looking back on our culture through the artifacts of our lives.

"Parasites Like Us" will make you laugh. But more importantly, it will make you think about what it means to be human. I look forward to other novels by Johnson.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Powerful, Funny, Moving!, August 19, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: Parasites Like Us (Hardcover)

Wow, this book really blew me away. I thought it was just a silly farce at first -- lighthearted fun. But the ending is phenomenal and so real! I am recommending it to all my friends and I can't wait to ready anything else Johnson writes.

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This is the way the world ends, June 16, 2006

By 

T. K. Kenyon "Author" - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Parasites Like Us (Mass Market Paperback)

Or at least civilization.

Adam Johnson's wondrously funny novel reaches into the murky depths of academia, where the next publication is the most important one, where the next discovery can make or break your career, and drags to the surface the deep-seated politics and rivalries of the academic department.

Anthropologist and Professor Hank Hannah believes that by studying the lost people of the planet, he can understand how he loses the people he loves, but his day-to-day life is far more prosaic as he grades undergrad papers and writes grant proposals than any Indiana Jones adventure. His graduate student, Eggers, goes native to better understand the ancient people he's studying and becomes a celebrity in academic journals. To do this, Eggers sets up camp in the university park, subsisting off roots, berries, grubs, and whatever he can catch in his snares, which includes squirrels and Pomeranians. He is, however, raiding vending machines on campus because no one can live like that. When Eggers finds a Clovis Point, a perfect spear tip, on grounds belonging to a Native American casino, they decide to dig in secret. What they find ends civilization.

Johnson's book Parasites Like Us is a smart, funny inquiry into the nature of competition and depletion in our culture. If you liked Fluke by Christoper Moore, try this one. For the over-educated misanthrope, it's a must-must-must read.

TK Kenyon
Author of Rabid: A Novel and Callous: A Novel