The Barbarian Parade: Pursuit of the Un-American Dream

by Kirby Gann

A novel about soccer

Genres: Fiction

288 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2004

About the author

Kirby Gann is the author of the novels Ghosting, The Barbarian Parade, and Our Napoleon in Rags. He is also co-editor (with poet Kristin Herbert) of the anthology A Fine Excess: Contemporary Literature at Play, which was a finalist for the ForeWord Magazine Book of the Year Award (Anthologies). His work has appeared most recently in The Lumberyard and The Oxford American, among other journals. He is the recipient of an Individual Artist Fellowship and two Professional Assistance Awards from the Kentucky Arts Council, and an Honorable Mention in The Pushcart Prize Anthology. Gann is Managing Editor at Sarabande Books, and teaches in the brief-residency MFA in Writing Program at Spalding University. He lives with his wife Stephanie, a horticulturist, and three dogs.

Reviews

[Meen · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the reviewers (on the back cover) of this book compared it to The Catcher in the Rye, which I've never read. Is Catcher about sports and tragically self- and other-destructive masculinity? (I'm not sure what I always thought Catcher was about--maybe a farmhand, but I never equated "catcher" in the title with the position in baseball... Is that what it is?)

So, aside from the disgusting (and unfortunately, probably accurate) portrayal of masculinity in this book, I was most affected by the portrayal of the narrator's mother's alcoholism. It made me think that this first novel is probably pretty autobiographical beyond just the soccer story. (The author was a semi-pro player.) Some things are hard to get right if you haven't lived it, and Olive the alcoholic and the family response to her was spot-on. I wasn't an English major (only a minor and that mostly technical writing and rhetoric stuff), so my reviews are rarely about writing styles or lit-crit-y. What makes good writing for me is how I feel during and after reading it, how much it stays in my mind once it's over. The alcoholism, the family dysfunction, made me ponder my own recovery and wonder about my own family in a way I haven't in a while, why some of us (well, just me mostly) change and some of us don't, how anyone ever gets "healthy" at all... The masculinity made me nauseous, and not in the mostly annoying, rolling my eyes, holding my nose Hemingway kind of way. This shit was brutal. Doomed. And sad. I'm still processing it. I even talked about it with my therapist today. That's some powerful stuff, huh?

(This was definitely a nice surprise for a dollar. And it's even signed by the author!)

[Drew Lackovic · Rating 3 out of 5]

A well written and gritty book, I really enjoyed the story's momentum up until the end of the third section. The final section felt like too much denouement for what we got out of Gaby's character--really by the end of the book, Gaby hasn't come to terms with anything. While I'm not sure he should have some major epiphany, the ending still felt a little rushed and flat. Overall though, great prose, and a goodly amoutn of grit.

[Cristina]

Again, I have this on my bookshelf and I gave it to my husband to read first. He read a ton of cookbooks, but not much literature. He needed something to do while he waited three or more hours for me to get done with chemotherapy. Gann is another faculty member in my MFA program. Jay said he liked this book a lot.

[Win Dunwell · Rating 4 out of 5]

I liked it.