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Wasp Box
“Wasp Box is full of wonders, by which I mean it’s full of drunken fathers and the Finger Lakes of New York and middling wineries and too-smart-and-nosy-for-their-own-good kids and bomb shelters and young love and lost love and lost diaries and killer wasps. In this, his unbelievably smart, tense, breakneck first novel, Ockert has made something strange, and great, a book that is absolutely impossible to put down once you’ve started it.”—BROCK CLARKE, author of Exley
“With sentences as darting and sharp as the wasps that haunt this remarkable debut novel, Jason Ockert has crafted an unforgettable vision of an America—and a family—in peril.”—LAURA VAN DEN BERG, author of The Isle of Youth
“Wasp Box may cause swelling, itching, anaphylactic shock, renal failure, barbed terror, stinging empathy, and profound joy.”—BENJAMIN PERCY, author of Red Moon
When a soldier returning home to a small New York town inadvertently transports an invasive species of deadly parasitic wasps, he sets off a frightening chain of events that throws an entire community into an unpredictable crisis. Escalating in its psychological, emotional, and narrative intensity, Ockert’s gripping first novel examines the choices individuals make in the face of danger, the limits of personal strength, and the value of family loyalty when the familiar world unravels.
Praise for Ockert’s previous
“Ockert’s voice is quirky, funny, and totally original—it conveys, in these dreamlike, virtuosic stories, a strange and vulnerable kindness you haven’t read before.”—George Saunders, author of Tenth of December
“Beautiful stories, searching and generous. Ockert never ceases to astound.”—Junot Díaz, author of The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
“Ockert’s plots are hair-raisingly original, his humor is feverish and dark, his language soars. And yet no matter what altitude of weird Ockert achieves here, his imaginary worlds are always populated by real people, characters who matter deeply to each other, and to their readers.”—Karen Russell, author of Swamplandia!
“With sentences as darting and sharp as the wasps that haunt this remarkable debut novel, Jason Ockert has crafted an unforgettable vision of an America—and a family—in peril.”—LAURA VAN DEN BERG, author of The Isle of Youth
“Wasp Box may cause swelling, itching, anaphylactic shock, renal failure, barbed terror, stinging empathy, and profound joy.”—BENJAMIN PERCY, author of Red Moon
When a soldier returning home to a small New York town inadvertently transports an invasive species of deadly parasitic wasps, he sets off a frightening chain of events that throws an entire community into an unpredictable crisis. Escalating in its psychological, emotional, and narrative intensity, Ockert’s gripping first novel examines the choices individuals make in the face of danger, the limits of personal strength, and the value of family loyalty when the familiar world unravels.
Praise for Ockert’s previous
“Ockert’s voice is quirky, funny, and totally original—it conveys, in these dreamlike, virtuosic stories, a strange and vulnerable kindness you haven’t read before.”—George Saunders, author of Tenth of December
“Beautiful stories, searching and generous. Ockert never ceases to astound.”—Junot Díaz, author of The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao
“Ockert’s plots are hair-raisingly original, his humor is feverish and dark, his language soars. And yet no matter what altitude of weird Ockert achieves here, his imaginary worlds are always populated by real people, characters who matter deeply to each other, and to their readers.”—Karen Russell, author of Swamplandia!
188 pages, Paperback
First published September 14, 2014
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
June 4, 2015
On the inside cover of my copy of Wasp Box, Jason wrote that he hopes the book would rattle around in my skull awhile. But it won't. Rather, Wasp Box will buzz, it will sting and leave behind the hot and thick venom that is my own ongoing fear of bees, wasps, hornets and all other flying and stinging insects.
Like the venom, like a summer on a western New York vineyard, Ockert's prose is slow moving. The reader feels the stifling heat, the poison ivy rashes, the resulting buzz of iced wine. The reader hears the buzz of wasps, the splash of water, the nailing of drywall. Ockert has a way of making his stories a reality for the reader and more than once I found myself shuddering, filled with unease.
Wasp Box is a book about alcoholism and anger and PTSD and war and sadness and love and sex and death and summer and friendship and brotherhood and fatherhood and so so so so much more, and like the parasitic wasps of the novel, this book will buzz around in my head, will plant its larvae, and will likely drive me mad.
Like the venom, like a summer on a western New York vineyard, Ockert's prose is slow moving. The reader feels the stifling heat, the poison ivy rashes, the resulting buzz of iced wine. The reader hears the buzz of wasps, the splash of water, the nailing of drywall. Ockert has a way of making his stories a reality for the reader and more than once I found myself shuddering, filled with unease.
Wasp Box is a book about alcoholism and anger and PTSD and war and sadness and love and sex and death and summer and friendship and brotherhood and fatherhood and so so so so much more, and like the parasitic wasps of the novel, this book will buzz around in my head, will plant its larvae, and will likely drive me mad.
September 1, 2018
I came with the plan of ranting about how Jason Ockert made me hate a man and furious every time this man spoke. Nolan is a typical asshole dad, one who treats his ex-wife's kid, Joshua "Speck", as "not my kid", he treats him as this background noise. He treats his son, Hudson as "big one's mine, little one ain't" and that line alone just riled me up. It is a ride to see this man, Speck, and Hudson go through things.
The writings of the diary Speck finds are gorgeous, the information on wasps is spot on and clear. The dogs are charming animals that grow on you in a whimsical way. Every character brings something to the table, good or bad. You cannot go wrong with this subtle yet creepy ride. It's not a gore fest, it's not too grisly, but it is super screwed up. Crowley is detestable on sight, and the less I knew about him the better. But Jason didn't stray from making a man that foul get up in the space of the reader and unnerve them.
This book holds no punches, and though I've spoiled nothing, I hope readers who want to see a book that stands out like a wasp on your clothes does, and makes you pull back and swat just as fast, will pick this book up and give it a read.
I can't say the ending would be better or worse written any way but how it was. Everyone was flesh and bone, meat and fiber, it was an amazing read under two-hundred pages long and definitely something to pick up and binge on a long ride somewhere or while vacationing. Cannot recommend it enough.
Now just to find some people who dislike Nolan as much as I do to converse with. Because this book left me with a lot to say, but I don't want to consume my review with the rant I have solely for him.
The writings of the diary Speck finds are gorgeous, the information on wasps is spot on and clear. The dogs are charming animals that grow on you in a whimsical way. Every character brings something to the table, good or bad. You cannot go wrong with this subtle yet creepy ride. It's not a gore fest, it's not too grisly, but it is super screwed up. Crowley is detestable on sight, and the less I knew about him the better. But Jason didn't stray from making a man that foul get up in the space of the reader and unnerve them.
This book holds no punches, and though I've spoiled nothing, I hope readers who want to see a book that stands out like a wasp on your clothes does, and makes you pull back and swat just as fast, will pick this book up and give it a read.
I can't say the ending would be better or worse written any way but how it was. Everyone was flesh and bone, meat and fiber, it was an amazing read under two-hundred pages long and definitely something to pick up and binge on a long ride somewhere or while vacationing. Cannot recommend it enough.
Now just to find some people who dislike Nolan as much as I do to converse with. Because this book left me with a lot to say, but I don't want to consume my review with the rant I have solely for him.
October 20, 2023
There are pieces of this narrative I love, that hurt my heart (and my ear drum). All the buzzing really works to hum you along.
If you're familiar with Ockert's work, Wasp Box reads like an elongated version of his short stories, for better or for worse. I found myself thinking a lot about his story "Still Life" which can be found in Neighbors of Nothing. The boy. The train tracks. The carcass. The imaginary conversations. Ockert's characters roam the same landscape as the children in Stephen King's The Body.
It's an interesting endeavor, reading the novel of one of your favorite short fiction writers. Highly recommend for anyone trying to do their own work.
If you're familiar with Ockert's work, Wasp Box reads like an elongated version of his short stories, for better or for worse. I found myself thinking a lot about his story "Still Life" which can be found in Neighbors of Nothing. The boy. The train tracks. The carcass. The imaginary conversations. Ockert's characters roam the same landscape as the children in Stephen King's The Body.
It's an interesting endeavor, reading the novel of one of your favorite short fiction writers. Highly recommend for anyone trying to do their own work.
May 23, 2019
Overall, I thought it was a good book, but some of the plot points felt a little too convenient while one other story arc seemed somewhat unnecessary.
October 9, 2020
I thoroughly enjoyed This coming of age horror novel. I liked the characters, enjoyed the story, and absolutely hated the wasps.
March 26, 2015
Seriously creepy ... and no woo-woo. I didn't much like how the 3rd-part narration jumped around from character to character (within chapters, but it's a riveting story.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews