What do you think?
Rate this book
The Friends of Freeland
In this roomy, bawdy, exuberantly comic novel, Brad Leithauser takes us to an imaginary island-country, Freeland, during a crucial election year.
Freeland occupies its own place in the North Atlantic, somewhere between Iceland and Greenland. A geological miracle, it is desolate ("What green is to Ireland, gray is to Freeland") -- and inspiring.
The "friends" of the title are Hannibal, an expansive, lovable, unruly giant of a man who has been President of Freeland for twenty years, and Eggert, his shrewd, often prickly, always devious sidekick and adviser, who is Poet Laureate of Freeland and the book's narrator.
As the book opens, Freeland -- long happily isolated and stubbornly independent -- is in trouble. The sins of the rest of the world have begun to wash up on its shores in the form of drugs, restless youth, and a polluted, fished-out ocean. And, to add to the complications, when Hannibal, who has promised to step down as president, decides to run again, the opposition imports three "electoral consultants" from the United States.
As the story unfolds, the histories of the friends are revealed. While Hannibal is Fate's adored, Eggert travels perpetually under a cloud. Orphaned early, he must make his way by his wits. We follow him from his youth as he adventures Down Below (any place south of Freeland), collecting women, lovers, children, restlessly churning out fifty books in his search for love and admiration, returning home at last to raise a family and to serve his friend in his political hour of need.
This huge, stunning, magical book brims with delicious satire as the independent-minded natives meet the U.S.-trained "spin doctors"; a vibrant comic-strip vitality; and an edgy poignancy.
Best of all, Leithauser has created a whole world, at once uncannily like and unlike our own. Readers who journey to Freeland will find it both a land of wonders and an ideal place from which to view the world they've left behind.
Freeland occupies its own place in the North Atlantic, somewhere between Iceland and Greenland. A geological miracle, it is desolate ("What green is to Ireland, gray is to Freeland") -- and inspiring.
The "friends" of the title are Hannibal, an expansive, lovable, unruly giant of a man who has been President of Freeland for twenty years, and Eggert, his shrewd, often prickly, always devious sidekick and adviser, who is Poet Laureate of Freeland and the book's narrator.
As the book opens, Freeland -- long happily isolated and stubbornly independent -- is in trouble. The sins of the rest of the world have begun to wash up on its shores in the form of drugs, restless youth, and a polluted, fished-out ocean. And, to add to the complications, when Hannibal, who has promised to step down as president, decides to run again, the opposition imports three "electoral consultants" from the United States.
As the story unfolds, the histories of the friends are revealed. While Hannibal is Fate's adored, Eggert travels perpetually under a cloud. Orphaned early, he must make his way by his wits. We follow him from his youth as he adventures Down Below (any place south of Freeland), collecting women, lovers, children, restlessly churning out fifty books in his search for love and admiration, returning home at last to raise a family and to serve his friend in his political hour of need.
This huge, stunning, magical book brims with delicious satire as the independent-minded natives meet the U.S.-trained "spin doctors"; a vibrant comic-strip vitality; and an edgy poignancy.
Best of all, Leithauser has created a whole world, at once uncannily like and unlike our own. Readers who journey to Freeland will find it both a land of wonders and an ideal place from which to view the world they've left behind.
528 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1997
About the author
Brad Leithauser
54 books66 followersBRAD LEITHAUSER is a widely acclaimed poet and novelist and the recipient of numerous awards and honors, including a MacArthur Fellowship. This is his seventeenth book. He is a professor in the Writing Seminars at Johns Hopkins University and divides his time between Baltimore and Amherst.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
August 23, 2020
Extremely tedious reading. Had a decent premise but it is at least 200 pages too long and terribly meandering.
April 4, 2007
I’m going to go out on a limb and call this the best book you’ve never heard of. An amazingly rich novel of aging, friendship, and maleness, though such a list does no credit to such a dense text. The publicity material chooses to focus on the political satire angle, which is completely misleading. It is a slow, complex, and thoroughly enjoyable read.
July 17, 2016
I enjoyed this immensely, but although it had a lead character who rivaled Don Quixote, a social setting explored as minutely as even Trollope could do it, savage political satire (perfect for the 2016 election, and endlessly entertaining word play, the parts never seemed to join successfully together.
October 7, 2023
genuinely the WORST book i’ve ever read. I don’t think i’ve ever hated the main character in a novel so much. eggert is a self-loathing, sexually repressed little man that pushes away anyone that attempts to get close to him. on top of that, he describes his daughter wayyyyy too sexually for anyone to feel comfortable. there was no point to reading this book and i truly wish i hadn’t spent the time dragging myself through all 500 pages
December 6, 2014
Definitely a different sort of author who creates a novel about a place, about a community, about struggles, families, tragedy, and more. I gotta say, I enjoyed his humor, his characters, their stories, and the fight against change. It was fun.
March 25, 2017
I loved this book. It has such a vivid sense of place that you feel you are living with the characters.
October 9, 2016
I read this in the 90s, and liked it enough that I immediately bought A Few Corrections...which I couldn't get into at all.
Read
June 3, 2018Typically a fan of satire, I had to forced myself through the first chapter. Then I thought, why the heck am I making myself read this extremely unappealing book? Looked it up on Goodreads to see that many people like it. However, I also learned that there are book categories called "Culled" and "Discarded." This falls into both of those for me. I'm putting it in the library book sale bin for someone who might like it.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews