Bowlaway

McCracken is a firecracker stylist and every sentence, every image, is crafted for physical impact… It is exuberant, a bit bonkers and raw and unflinching. It will find a great many fans – and no doubt some awards, too. -- Lucy Atkins * Sunday Times *
A big, glorious novel in every sense, this sprawling family saga… is a funny and big-hearted epic froma seriously gifted wordsmith. -- Samantha Irby * Marie Claire *
McCracken’s rambunctious saga [Bowlaway]… isa funhouse of a novel. Even the most incidental of characters are granted glorious vignettes… in [an] unpredictable and startling world. -- Wendy Erskine * Spectator *
[McCracken has] considerable gifts as a novelist [and] instinctive access to the most intricate threads of human thought and feeling... This novel’s cast grows epic, but McCracken is always most impressive when she works small, when she is describing movie kisses or corsets or simply loneliness and longing. * New York Times *
Death and life, frosted with macabre comedy: it’s why we’ve enjoyed Elizabeth McCracken since her debut novel, The Giant’s House… nothing is ordinary in this story… There’s a wickedness to McCracken’s technique, the way she lures us in with her witty voice and oddball characters but then kicks the wind out of us… endlessly surprising. -- Ron Charles * Washington Post *