A Bended Circuity

by Robert S. Stickley

A dense, brilliant, even Freudian rompstomp of southern US deep white insanity, along with wars cold and hot as they bear on said insane white folk, who have strange ideas regarding north and south, which bodes ill east and west.
Some of the best writing to come out of any known region of any south anywhere, this inventive maximalist demi-comedy will convince readers that the latest great generation of writers was not that ending with the coming death of William Vollman, to whom Robert S. Stickley compares favorably.
Hint to impatient readers: wait for Dyxsov.

Genres: Fiction, Literary Fiction

639 pages, Hardcover

First published July 7, 2022

Reviews

[Rick Harsch · Rating 5 out of 5]

I published this book and entered this concentric cover version here, so all I will say is absolutely this book is of National Book Award quality, no offense--it has the same chance of winning as Pynchon's third novel did...but it is no pandering placatory promise of change. In fact lack of change is central to the plot. Read til you get to Dyxsov's reason for being in the novel and if you aren't hooked, well, maybe Chandler Brossard's Wake Up. We're Almost There is more the book for you.
As soon as I finished reading the book I was flooded with thoughts for a lengthy review, and I think this will become one in time. What happened was a giant brainsucking sponge descended immediately after I awoke the day following and the process of desication lasted a full 50 plus hours. But this book is itself a flood--designed by the army corpse of engineers in their prime, a controlled flood--so I will continue.
The book will be dogged by fixation on its vocabulary, but up to now I haven't noticed overmuch scyuglery among readers. All reviews have been favorable, most of them downright laudatory. That's because the writing is of such high levels in terms of register, poetry, philosophy, descriptive natural facet, descriptive psychological facet, and sheer accuracy all about that the fact that most readers will have the opportunity to learn hundreds of words per chapter is either an act of authorial generosity or not, depending on the reader.
This is a southern book, a civil war spoof, a satire, all affecting to disguise its main role as a soteriological giant of a novel. The primary character is Bradley Pincnit (comma hanging from that c if you can manage it), whose former plantation, Marigold, is the most opulent or at least wealthy of all them in the southern United States. Events at Marigold are bigger than other events, more imbued with meaning, and shrug off all laws natural and civic. So this is among all else, also a croquet novel. I needn't mention it's comic, as it would fail as satire otherwise, but it is comic on a grand scale when it needs to be, or feels like being. Certainly readers of fiction will all find this book short on action per fragment, yet if the writing itself isn't enough to pleasance a reader through, some terrifically funny scenes will serve as reward.
It is too early in the life of this book for me to defoliate the book by declaring it's meanings in specific terms, luckily, but there is definitely a Freudian frolic within, and Bradley is a man of what we have come to call enormous ego. Interestingly, he writes a bit like Stickley. Not a working man per se, Bradley has his own newspaper, and his high lingo treatises leave Stickley behind. There is another voice as well, a preacher who sermonizes here and there, and he, too, rivals Stickley. One of the most amazing feats of the novel, in fact, is Stickley's ability to write above and beyond in three different voices. I will need a second read to examine for traces of foreboding, but more or less, it is a few odd events conceived or misconceived, definitely at least partly conceived anyway, that set off the fatter strand of plot, which is Bradley's war, and war march, which would probably begin in the 20th minute of the three hour movie (should not be so, but Bela Tarr doesn't much care about US southerners, I have learned), and take viewers to within ten minutes of the end. So strayed off now, let me say this: A Bended Circuity is as strong an argument for the art of literature as you will find.
I'll be back.

[Kevin Adams · Rating 5 out of 5]

There’s a running theme in the documentary, Stone Reader (about the lost and neglected first novel called The Stones of Summer) about the great first novels ever written. They include the obvious and popular ones, The Recognitions, Invisible Man and the most-famous first novel ever, Catch-22. It’s an incredible part of the film because you get to hear again why you (we) love books so much. The point of this diatribe??? A Bended Circuity by RSS (Robert S. Stickley) will be added to this list. This book is truly an experience. Big and mind-bending. Smart and punch drunk wordy. Funny as heck. Yes, it’s really, really good.

A Bended Circuity is being released by Corona Samizdat press (link below) and Rick Harsch has called it National Book Award worthy. I couldn’t agree more. Few novels can be this erudite without being condescending to the reader. I love Darconville’s Cat as much as the next guy but I feel like Theroux is laughing at me sometimes because I’m not as smart as he. Robert S. Stickley doesn’t (and I get the feeling, would never) do that. It’s a mature and smart novel for smart people. And who doesn’t love to read with their dictionary in hand (ok, the dictionary app on their phone)?

Bradley Pincit is truly a unique character in modern lit. Man this guy sucks. In Stickley’s hands Bradley and his crew (with names that rival only Against the Day) take the South by storm. Literally. Stickley does for South Carolina what Faulkner did for Mississippi or Willa Cather did for Nebraska/Great Plains (and thousands more writers…) put you in a time and place that all you had to do is let them whisk you away. Beautiful.

This book is thick. This book will make you laugh. And this book will make you happy that smart, good people are writing and producing excellent literature in the world.

Oh, and 2 1/2 pages of a croquet tournament that would make Roger Angell proud. It took me a while to get to my point…READ THIS BOOK!!!

https://coronasamizdat.com/index.php?...

[Christopher Robinson · Rating 5 out of 5]

No exaggeration: this is the most impressive debut novel I’ve read, apart from The Recognitions by William Gaddis. Seriously. It’s staggering to me that I’m even getting to make that statement right now, for I never could have imagined another first novel even coming close. No offense to any other first novels. I’ve read and loved many, many wonderful first novels. But… I mean, come on… Gaddis just nailed it.

And yet, a rival emerges out of nowhere one day, and now I have an unexpected tie on my hands.

Enter A Bended Circuity by Robert S. Stickley.

The quality of the writing is readily apparent from moment one. Behold this beautiful doozy of an opening paragraph:

In this place, outside elements are rendered useless. Gusts of wind eddy through a barricade of limbs and leaves and are left diminished in a subarboreal world where they harmlessly whirl, confusing lightweight materials such as finely woven garments and crocus leaves. This expansive canopy of intermingling oaks shelters a swath of land and it’s occupants from the brunt of discomposing forces pestering lime besetting sin.

It’s not just my eyes, right? Slow down and read it out loud… to my ear, this prose just sings. And that’s just the opening!

So, somewhat naturally in the wake of such a bold opening, a part of me kept waiting for it to fall off, lose some of its steam, lose itself, strive for glory but ultimately fall short, etc. But it never did, it somehow swerved every possible pitfall and beat the odds and somehow only got better and more addictive as I went along.

On a prose level, I’ll unhesitatingly describe it as being masterful. This is an intensely, boldly erudite novel, and the formidable lexicon is wielded with precision and care, utilized to gloriously poetic ends. Honestly, I can’t recall a single moment during my reading where I wasn’t in complete awe of the quality of the writing. Its style enamored me on each of its 637 type-dense pages.

And then there’s the story! I’ll keep it basic and avoid spoilers. Simply put, it depicts a neo-Confederate uprising circa the late 1960s/early 1970s. It’s a troubling scenario to consider, and unfortunately a rather timely-feeling one in 2022. But never fear, for as serious as this book may initially appear, behind its heady prose lies a wicked sense of humor, an absolutely brutal satirical edge. Plus its got action in abundance! Romance! Soviet spies! Musical spittooning! Birds! Scandalous carousings of the social elite! Heartbreaking scenes of domestic despair! Rare horses that trot exclusively in reverse! Intensely competitive croquet tournaments! Elaborate floral arrangements! Two men dueling with… never mind, some things are better discovered on one’s own.

Let’s recap: this book is hugely entertaining and conventionally compelling on a story level, and the writing itself is spectacular. And so the inevitable question: what the hell are you waiting for? Read this book as soon as you possibly can. It deserves your attention.

A Bended Circuity is an astonishing artistic achievement. It gladdens my heart to know that brilliant books like this one are still out there being written, even in secret. (Maybe even especially in secret.) I hope it finds the large audience it so richly deserves, and I’m greatly looking forward to following Robert S. Stickley’s work in the years to come.

[Seth Austin · Rating 4 out of 5]

April - a month spent frantically hopscotching between novels - brought with it one stable daily read across my four weeks of consistently inconsistent page-flipping. The novel in question also turned out to be one of the stranger and more ambitious texts I’ve read in recent years. Pitched to me as a Modern Maximalist Masterpiece (henceforth M3) by fellow readers in my digital orbit, A Bended Circuity by Robert S. Stickley (who compacts his name into the initialism ‘RSS’) certainly exhibits all the taxonomic defiances one would come to expect from an M3, but is that third M a justifiable laurel to be wreathed upon this glitzy new doorstopper? I suppose that would be the ambition of this review. Read on if the argument amuses you.

I suppose a lay of the land is in order. A Bended Circuity is the debut novel from RSS, published in July of 2022 via Corona Samizdat, a Slovenian micro-press known for championing eclectic, subversive fiction as well as packaging books in a manner that resembles Bolivian cocaine shipments (search #RickBrick if you’re unfamiliar). Despite the Mom n’ Pop presentation of the press, their editor has a knack for picking critical hits – I myself have yet to encounter a miss. By saying so, I suppose I’ve just laid my cards on the table a little early here. Yes, I am a fan of what RSS has accomplished over the course of these densely-packed 592 pages. But my admiration is not without reservations, which I’ll get to shortly. I think it’s only fitting that my review of a book with “circuity” in its title has its own allotment of digressions.

ABC (hopefully the initialism should be self-explanatory) is a novel amenable to meandering exploration but hostile as direct summarisation. I can’t imagine that’s a surprise to anyone who is teeing up to read it themselves. Even the dust jacket summary defies diegetic explanation:

“There are screams in the night. Interlopers are afoot, have taken hold. Wildfires are burning the countryside and the gentry are running for cover. Fortunes are at stake. The South will not sleep.”

If you have read (or are currently reading – Godspeed) ABC, you may find yourself struggling to chronologically situate the story, so let me attempt to shine a torch into the proverbial fogbank. The novel opens in Charleston, South Carolina during the declining days of August 1969 and chronicles a year of narrative action, ending in late July 1970. Let the record reflect that it personally took several passes of close reading particular sequences to piece together a timeline. The plantations, mentions of slave quarters, foot soldier battles, and liberal use of old rhotic Anglo-Saxon English made me feel initially as though this was set near the American Civil War. I took some solace in speaking with the author directly and learning the chronology was intentionally cluttered with anachronisms and obfuscations, imbuing the finished product with a hazy, transhistorical atmosphere. I didn’t probe RSS too much on the subject of his intentions here, though one could infer that untethering it from clear historical signifiers allows the story’s message (and ideological axe ready for grinding) to be mapped onto events past, present, and future. Because what is the glorious US of A if not an exercise in “I know this didn’t go right last time, but let’s give it another go”?

This leads me inelegantly to the players and plot. The Long Sixties of RSS’s alternate reality in the American Gothic South usher in with it a protagonist – to whatever extent that an ensemble novel can be considered as having one – named Bradley Pinçnit. Yes, that’s “Pinçnit” with a cedilla diacritical accent below the c. Bradley, a wealthy municipal newspaper owner and vocal neo-confederate, finds his jingoist way of life wronged one evening in the summer of ’69 when a blacktie ball hosted at his Greek Revival “Marigold” Manor, is interrupted by a series of.. pranks(?) as far as I can tell, which culminate in an oversized paintball attack on Charleston and an unplanned fireworks display. This humiliates him and his family in direct view of the Southern “Upper” Elite, upon whose communal opinion his social standing is precariously perched. As a staunchly conservative ideologue, Bradley responds in a manner proportionate to the perceived wrongdoing against him: by corralling a mass of likeminded, heavily armed, Republican extremists and marching North on backwards horseback (read the book, it’ll make sense later). Their path toward the nation’s capital weaves, past “that despicable milestone at the North of the Mason-Dixon Line and its untalked-of pressing down on us”, through a carnival of histrionics and plot machinations. Bradley and Co. have no trouble amassing an army along the way who feel they are “in between wars here, not antebellum, not post-bellum, rather a lingering hiatus of intrabellum, a period of unsettled hostility felt by conquered people that yearn for retribution.” Their goal? Blurry at best… which is at least in part the point. Bradley and his “Junto of Condign Men” become so fixated on their task of seeking revenge and reclaiming their dominant position in the American imagination, that they’ve somewhat glossed over the exact “who” they’re after in their winding Northward crawl.

The narrative confusion is further compounded with the reader’s (yeah, that’s you) inevitable realisation that the nexus of antagonism is multifaceted. If that’s not a characteristic quality of an M3, I don’t know what is. Bradley’s Junto sets their sights (pun intended) on a whole manner of perceived wrongdoers during their journey North, including a band of Latino Renegados, slaves (they appear to still exist in some capacity here), Cantina owners, any passersby with vaguely Liberal leanings, and at times, themselves. It’s a close reader’s wet dream trying to identify the puppet master thumbing the wires and string. Given its late 60’s setting – the Cold War not yet in the rear-view mirror – it’s not exactly a reach to position a Russian Sleeper Agent as one possible locus of their designs. I’m editorialising now, but I’d like to suggest that the agent in question, Maxim Dyxsov, is far and away the most interesting character in the book). Through piecemeal exposition, it’s eventually revealed that Dyxsov is at least in part responsible for igniting this second iteration of the American Civil War; an honest-to-goodness False Flag the likes of which you’re bound to hear accused if you regularly watch Fox News (if you do, Bradley would love to have you join his cause).

I haven’t exactly hidden my own politics here, have I? I normally like to maintain a cool distance from the subject of my criticism, but I find it difficult to compartmentalise an affective response when reading ABC because this book made me (interrupting periods for dramatic effect) So. Fucking. Angry. The kind of anger that’s uniquely provoked by reading a text that is viscously honest in its reflection of the “what the fuck is going on?!” reality we’ve constructed for ourselves.

Let me reposition myself before I give a false impression of blame. My anger isn’t laid at the feet of RSS or even his book in question, but rather the context in which this book was read: April 2023. On a daily basis, I have the displeasure of watching (mercifully, from a transcontinental distance) Supreme Court Justices accepting bribes to sway their opinions, of bodily autonomy being slowly repealed, of firearm ownership growing at a rate matched only by its death toll. Need I go on here? There’s a sickness growing in the governing authority of these three hundred million and change. A nation that doesn’t recognise the laugh-out-loud irony in calling itself “United” despite teetering constantly on the brink of yet another civil war… which RSS has imagined here is vivid, vaudevillian detail. For all its moments of hysterical absurdity – literal cock fights and musical spittoon performances among them – ABC’s rendering of the American condition (and indeed the larger Capitalist project) is simultaneously a window and a mirror. Or, to put it in Floydian terms, it’s a prism; a prism I can’t help but refract the world through. As is tradition in an M3, the author has left no cultural stone unturned, particularly in his depiction of how blind faith can act as a catalyst to a latent social pathology. This cadre of revolutionaries, guided by the iconography of the mysterious “Red Radical”, allow their outrage to proceed exponentially as they tear northward of the 39th Parallel, with the voice of omniscient preacher interrupting the narrative periodically to sermonise at both the characters he presides over, but also the reader directly. Yes, the book may be an exercise in labyrinthian plotting of the highest order, but one could make the case that it’s just as much a homily to the Heartland’s Soul; an American Prayer, if you'll forgive my deployment of a tired cliche.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t address the prose, as this is the quality of the novel that most reviews focus heavily on. RSS recently posted on his socials that he was waiting for someone to “lay into his book and tell him it’s the worst thing they’ve ever read”. I’m not going to be that guy, as this is far from the worst thing I’ve ever read. Conversely, this is actually one of (if not the) strongest novels – particularly debut novels – I’ve read in the past several years. However, in spite of that suggestion, I’m going to offer a fairly blunt criticism that I very rarely offer: ABC is overwritten. I normally revel and bask in lexical exuberance, but ABC is a paragonal example of allowing the language to proceed beyond the bandwidth of unreserved enjoyment and land somewhere in the desert of exhaustion. Let me take this a bit further. it won’t take the reader more than a chapter or two to recognise that RSS positions himself as a prose stylist first and foremost, with all the other elements of structure and narrative playing second fiddle. To put it another less incendiary way, “the language is the story” here. Am I suggesting the diegesis is inconsequential? Absolutely not. It’s the story that lit a furious fire under my ass and compelled me to a 2500-word polemic on the state of the American populous. Personally speaking, frustration and enthusiasm are responses that will only come from a text that reaches out and grabs me by the proverbial collar. If I had kept ABC at an arm’s length, this review would’ve been two sentences in a slapdash star rating. I’m getting away from the point again, aren’t I? I think that story would’ve benefited from denying the authorial impulse toward ten-dollar words when a two-dollar word will do. Let me offer an exhibit of one of the simpler passages you’ll find in ABC:

“All men are part of God’s method and plan. From atheist to zealot, all men are working toward the same thing. Scientist or sectarian, they are not enemies but rather partners in gridlocking sanctity with progresses, of eradicating the aboriginal ‘harmony’ that infected this planet so long. And neither are even entities, rather paths forward into the dim and yellowing climate lenient with the Sin of learning too far above the heads of mankind. They are both needed, wanted, as are all of you. We all play a part in The Great Dismantling.”

Picture this, for 600 pages. Gorgeous, erudite, rapturous, and fucking exhausting. This is the aspect of the novel that I think will turn off a certain demographic of readers, depending on their typical reading habits. Again, this is very much a case of “your mileage may vary” but as someone who regards Maximalism as his preferred genre of choice, it takes a very heavy hand for me to suggest that something is “overwritten”.

Now let me walk this back, as I don’t want to come off as unfairly critical. For all my frustration with the density of RSS’s prose deployment, I cannot argue that ABC is phenomenally styled as a work of prose. The author stretches the boundaries of contemporary language and constructs a unique syntactic logic that provides a New View of an Old World. People may criticise the dialect as archaic (not without some merit, mind you), but to do so would be to miss how the language services the story. This hyper-stylised rendition of the South is a transhistorical landscape where 19th and 20th Century touchstones are commonplace – remember whose foot soldier battles, plantations, and slaves I mentioned earlier? What better way to express the country’s cultural recapitulation than by employing the lexicon of the period from which those values are drawn? If Bradley wants his state and country to return to the era of pre-Emancipation, then he’ll have it: antiquation and all. I wasn’t pulling my punches when I said, “the language is the story”. I just wish that language didn’t draw so much attention to itself; less telling, more showing.

So where does all this leave me? As much as the critical glitterati would like to think that such a notion as an “objective” review exists, I assure you that beneath every 500-word New Yorker postmortem lies a deeply individual opinion that informs all the facts gathered to support it. The opinion here is that I’m simultaneously awed and frustrated with my reading experience. A Bended Circuity (dropping the initialism while I round this out) is a meticulously arranged, vividly lived-in picaresque experience... that also goes through painstaking and continuous efforts to channel Michael Lentz in telling you that “this is called WRITING”. Is that third M justified? Not quite, but RSS has made it abundantly clear that he has an incredible writing career ahead of him, and he has my immediate carte blanche purchase on anything he published in the future. Moreover, after allowing myself the necessary period if digestion, I am already anticipating a future reread of this slab, as there is plenty more I anticipate being able to mine from the text once a degree of familiarity has been established.

And so, I’ll wrap this up by quoting the opening line of this novel, which I view as a sort of Rosetta Stone for the nearly 600 pages that follow it:

“In this place, outside elements are rendered useless.”

No one will be able to help America until America learns to help itself.

[Daniel W · Rating 5 out of 5]

“IF IGNORANCE IS BLISS, THEN CHARLESTON IS HEAVEN.”

Simply put, Stickley’s debut, A Bended Circuity, is the breakout underground novel of the year. He lulls you in with a hypnotic mastery of the language, but just when you start getting comfortable, he shoves you face first into another absurdist scenario.
It’s a wild, hallucinogenic send up of the post-Antebellum south, replete with bizarre practical jokes, lunatic allegory, imaginary critters, bloodthirsty renegades, biblical curses, Cold War paranoia, and drunken buffoonery.
Fans of literary fiction with a big twist of mischief won’t want to miss this.

[Andrew Merritt · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ll add more substantial thoughts at a later date, but this was undoubtedly one of the finest works of fiction I have ever read

[Travis Meyer · Rating 5 out of 5]

A thrilling and vibrantly intelligent historical yarn that is also absurd, hilarious, deeply perceptive, and thus intensely thought-provoking, Robert Stickley’s first novel from Corona Samizdat press, for me, inserted itself directly amongst the very best pieces of fiction I’ve ever read. Before properly attempting a review I want to continue to heap a bit more praise, describe some of my personal experience, then explain some potential challenges it undoubtedly poses for certain readers.

The novel presents a vast array of ideas and potential revelations about the world, existence itself really, that I have grappled with significantly since finishing. The cognitive aftermath has been unprecedented. Staggered, I found myself probing the narration and eager to capture the essence of what the author is getting at or briefly revisiting a descriptive scene or the actions of a character in my mind’s eye, frantically skimming previous pages to verify stuff. I’ve been eager and not a little intimidated to review it, although I’ll say the sheer amount of time and cognition I allot towards our humble pastime, qualifies me enough to hopefully sway a few people towards seizing this amazing literary experience.

Quick here then: It’s endlessly immersive and surprising. Broadly erudite and never conventional. I think it could be called satiric, although as funny as it was at times, there were so many mental gears kicking in throughout it, that I found myself reading meticulously and exclusively for a month. The only disclaimer I intend to provide deals with the absolutely relentless vocabularic onslaught. Even a moderately impatient reader is likely to get frustrated, for there are a stunning amount of (likely) unfamiliar words, and I think the reader at some point early on needs to come to terms with an approach. For me, I understood that this would be an all or nothing endeavor, so I began taking the time to simply Google words, interestingly many of which I noticed fell under the lexical category of ‘archaic’. The number of words I didn’t know had to be hundreds, and I’m estimating that I looked up roughly two thirds of them, the others I was content with guessing at the meaning using context clues. It’s hard, and ambitious, and, if you’re intrigued right now and intend to read on, completely unspoilable.

Charleston, South Carolina, an elusive time period in American history that reads like an alternate reality, we are introduced to Bradley Pincnit, a genealogically privileged plantation owner, who for us is the pro/antagonistic conduit of ideas Stickley uses to present some fascinating concepts regarding humanity. In this novel he is a warmonger, a writer/journalist, an elite denizen of the South who fancies himself a man of faith and virtue. His fundamental mode of existence he feels is being threatened by a mysterious and hilariously unhostile invisible enemy that wreaks a kind of absurd and debauch chaos. Perhaps it’s the north, perhaps it’s the slaves, regardless, Bradley is a man of action and steps must be taken. Landscaping preparations for a prestigious croquet tournament go entertainingly awry. At an important sociopolitical soiree a musical group facilitates total psychological and behavioral devolution that leads to fire and mayhem throughout the grounds. Bradley forms the Junto of Condign Men, his fellow ‘Uppers’, to take up arms with the hope of defending their birthright and way of life. The other main narrative involves this elusive enemy, and one Maksim Dyxov, an aged Russian espionage weapon, another brilliantly conceived character. There is a brooding sense of culmination and reckoning as these two plot strands converge amidst masterful prose that includes fascinating digressions, beautifully intricate descriptions of everything from botany to basic instincts, absurdist scenarios with outlandish characters and silly situations that end up being somehow serious. As I stray further from my goal of presenting a synopsis, I’ll finally just indicate that some of the final portions of the book I reread more than once, both in marvel and pontification, and when I closed this book was left with a truly profound feeling of awe and appreciation, as well as a sense of hope and relief that literature like this is still possible and, better yet, getting published. While reading this book I decided to make informal notes, amounting in roughly 3 pages of loose-leaf, and attempted to keep the gorgeous physical copy in pristine condition. The rest of this review will essentially be a diffidently personal splattering of thoughts and reactions regarding characterization, structure, themes, along with some excerpts.

Pincnit and Dyxov anchor a fairly immense cast of characters, including Bradley’s wife Gabuirdine, who herself feels captive in her life with Bradley. They own a slave boy, Stafford Notering, who is compassionate and thoughtful, and tends to Gabuirdine’s doves. There are chapters that focus on the Compatriotas and someone know as ‘The Guerrero’, who intends to foment this sort of strange psychological and absurdist aggression. Other sections focus on Maksim Dyxov and those that he is tied to, like a sea-diving midget called Igor. There are certainly many more that are introduced to varying degrees, all neatly a part of the ‘plot’.

I found this book constructed very effectively. 8 sections, 21 total chapters that are roughly 25-40 pages long with a few space breaks here and there. Sifting through my notes, which bring me back to a great many very memorable scenes, I’m struck by how incredibly well conceived it all is. Wonderfully absurd stuff that I don’t want to spoil too much with detail, but feel unable to resist listing a few: There is an orgone accumulator experience; an actual cockfight; a stalking Tarbaby; a preacher named Fantting, maybe the philosophical framework for the story, who communicates in mystifying fashion; inept battle tactics from drunken soldiers; impalement by a massive bird; some flashbacks to the relatives of certain characters, including a beloved tightrope walking dancing giant; references to a mysterious alcohol or liquid concoction that induces debauchery; a brilliantly executed section that is an epic in verse involving Lucifer; a strange and influential kind of game, TallyHo Shadowland, played by kids that seems to involve telepathic emanations. All of it, simply put, is great to read. Despite the challenging vocabulary (which I argue could potentially be embraced and enhancing), the prose, including dialogue, brims with intelligence, beauty and sheer confidence. Here are some examples with a daub of context

At the start of a space break in which the narration shifts to Gabuirdine, isolated at the lushly beautiful and vast grounds of Marigold Manor, their plantation home:

“…Having blandished its producers from out the revived earth, the plantation dangles out its flowers as both trumperies and treats. The bumble bees are buzzing from lea to verdant lea, this vale twixt marigold and indigo in desperate need of feed. Where the nurslings and the lambkins devour all of ever-growing green, produce is unraveling on the upward stretching glebe. These demesnial tracts in this waning act of spring, hold the dance of Carolina’s annuals, upstanding alabastrine.
But there must come a stop. Gardens will overlap. That which is tended and pruned, fixed and pampered, stylized and made, must be continually worked in order to thwart the onslaught of nature’s pressing disease. Structure must be made of the elemental, some sense gleaned from the chaos we have been planted in, thrown to. Builded and reshaped, flat spaces must be made to walk upon more easily, a runner must. So it is such a footpath – that crooking line of polished stone-work wrapping Marigold – which delivers us a special committee of Lowcountry women making privilege amongst one another behind closed doors.” And off we are taken!

Through Bradley Pincnit, along with his Junto of Condign Men, Stickley provides a glimpse of the worst parts of our shared human condition. The final sections of the book read like a sermon or treatise on the nature of existence itself, and I went back to read it again, utterly spellbound. I realized with horror that in fact there are people somewhat like Bradley in our world. Those who default to an over-protective posture, quick to find offense, fail to give the benefit of doubt, are convinced they deserve a special kind of treatment, who manufacture competition and are willing to defend themselves with force for fear of losing what they know and understand.

“I think there is a personality characteristic emerged new to man, almost indefinable, unspoken but dominant: it is composed of one part blind acceptance, one part muted aggression.”

Could it not be argued that our comprehensive history as a species is nothing short of absolutely deplorable? Is our continued existence not fundamentally unsustainable? In case you aren’t aware, the world might be ending, and perhaps our species needs a reset, a rebirth, a cleansing. Maybe we should just focus on enjoying it while it lasts, and whatever we are faced with after should warrant no consideration, or every consideration, depending on your personal belief system. Personally, when I think deeply about the extended future, I find myself almost thwarted by a kind of disturbing realization; one that defies any hopeful ideas of an Eternal, and we all will be forced to reckon with our ‘Heritage of Sin’. Or, when the pale blue dot becomes something other than the only home we’ve known, will there be something else entirely? Something consummately miraculous that will save it all?

Point of view will shift ever so subtly once in a while, and as the perfectly riveting epilogue gathers its gorgeous momentum, I wanted to pluck some parts of it, both hopeful and horrific, for you to maybe sense the brilliance of.

“Follow me to where our created monsters mark their din upon the stripped-over plain and help me to ravage that different sentience. We will not cede to lack of want. Use your leisure to fill in all the bored expanses as you pant alongside and against nature’s banal order.”
“We may glimpse beauty, photographing it or limning it just this once, and then, by pawing at rarified beauty, corrupt it to extinction. This is what we have been ordered to do. That is our chore. At the end of this process we are droving forth, mindlessly moving forth, there is our promised land, our broader implication.”
“All the elemental properties lying dormant in elemental nature waiting to be discovered, like God’s grab bags, are ours to be released, waiting for the command found in a mounting moment to scatter.”
“All men are part of God’s method and plan. From atheist to zealot, all men are working toward the same thing. Scientist or sectarian, they are not enemies but rather partners in gridlocking sanctity with progresses, of eradicating the aboriginal ‘harmony’ that infected this planet so long. And neither are even entities, rather paths forward into the dim and yellowing climate lenient with the Sin of learning too far above the heads of mankind. They are both needed, wanted, as are all of you. We all play a part in The Great Dismantling.”

The end leaves the reader totally enraptured, alone naked and stunned after a literary hailstorm of profound concepts and lexical exploration. This novel deserves to be discussed deeply, lauded and celebrated as a fictional masterpiece. So much of it brought me terrifying perceptions and considerations, but I’ll conclude by saying the final paragraph is transcendently beautiful, and maybe even hopeful. Personally, I feel that this book is the perfect example of art that magnifies its rewards in relation to the amount of time and effort one is willing to give it. A book hangover? Up until a few weeks ago I’d say, skeptically, that I’m immune to them. I’m not. I’ve had false starts with no less than three other books I’d been anticipating and, alarmingly, Robert Stickley may have indeed fundamentally shifted my understanding and appreciation of fine literature. A monumental achievement. Be sure to snag your copy by contacting Rick Harsch at Corona Samizdat press, and while you’re at it pick up a few pocketbooks from other amazing authors.

[Jackson · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of those very special first novels in an authors career when they just come out absolutely swinging. When the stars align, when focus and craft mesh perfectly with the amateurish impulse to put every ounce of their soul into a single work. Lots of comparisons to Gaddis’ the Recognitions floating around reviews for A Bended Circuity and it’s easy to see why that comparison is made, few authors come right out of the gate so strongly.

A Bended Circuity is an ironic ode to casuistry, duplicity, and bigotry. A satirical celebration of the captains of industry, the gubernatorial nepotists, the Uppers of the south. The south is spurred to rise again following a slight by an unseen adversary. Those long descended from the antebellum apex of southern living act on the desire for a complete return to days they were in no way a part.

This book easily has the highest density of words-I-need-to-look-up per page out of probably any other book I’ve ever read. Stickley’s prose requires a thesaurus on hand. However it is done elegantly, I don’t feel the insane lexicon to be pretentious or aggravating, it feels right. Maybe a little silly that every single character talks with a Mensa level vocabulary, but it’s charming.

I feel like I have more to say but the final sprint to finish this book has worn me out. I think this book is incredible but it’s absolutely exhausting.

“In this War between the states, I think that every politician or man of renown must have a public stance and a private stance. That much has been covenanted in the Southern Tradition. You cannot go round saying what you believe, I’ve learnt you will pay the price for it…”

[Binston Birchill · Rating 5 out of 5]

In Charleston, South Carolina, amidst the “root bulb, peduncle, and withered florette” the landed gentry are converging for a grand soirée and competitive croquet.

But before “the moribund shoots of embrowning verdure” welcome the Uppers one and all, a tug of war occurs with an interloper “loosely mapped behind the grid of the secondary screen door.”

Strange happenings ensue, ribald humor abounds, the south will not rise again. It is already risen. So our demagogue collects his band of cheerfully named misfits and marches… south.

But enough of the tale, or rather, let’s not presume to spoil the unspoilable.

For all of the wonderful prose of Robert S. Stickley, for all of the unfamiliar words and the relentless density, I never once felt confused by the narrative or the characters of the novel. Maybe reading the book during a vacation helped but I think it also speaks to what he was able to achieve with A Bended Circuity.

Stickley crafted a relentlessly dense, highly challenging maximalist novel, with enough obscurity to keep the reader guessing. He performed a complex high wire act by balancing that with an eminently understandable narration.

Around the midway point I wondered if the second half would be more of the same and maybe slip a bit as a whole, 300-400 pages probably would have been enough if that was the case. Thankfully things didn’t stop there.

The long descriptive passages which dominate and delight in the first half of the novel are concatenated with a poem, a song, a letter from a wife left behind, a screed of the highest order, and as this circuitous novel bends towards its righteous conclusion, something with more gravitas than mere philosophical musings consumes us. It gives this book that weight which is needed to stand the test of time.

I’ve marked a few sections for an immediate reread because there are some extended passages that need a closer look.

In the end Stickley gives the reader what any great book gives, something to chew on. A Bended Circuity is a difficult pleasure and promises to dwell in the mind long after it’s set aside.

“All of these lineaments are fused together into one constructed mess.”

“This is heavenly.”

“This is borderline incestuous.”

“This is Friday night in the Lowcountry.”

Grab your dictionary. Pull up a chair. Enjoy this delightfully dense ribald tale inspired by our troubled times.

[John Dickson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Five Stars.
A tough and challenging read and it certainly offers a learning curve to the reader who chooses to dig deeper and find out what all those obscure words mean (the vocabulary used is high end exemplary - reintroducing words that may not have had their time in the sun, shaking them out out of those dusty tomes), and like all great books it teaches you how to read it and rewards perseverance. A remarkable achievement from a first time author.

... and very important this; besides the gravitas, this novel is very funny indeed.

Highly recommended.

[Tim Dearden]

Maximalist surrealist Freudian satirical Southern hellfire nightmare psychosexual romp (three quarters of a year and five or so other books later)

This is a fascism-as-paranoia (as esoteric terrorism - esoterrorism?) debut novel makes a strong case for an all-timer first work alongside stuff like The Recognitions.

The sermonic proselytizing throughout the novel absolutely could not be improvised and perfectly captures the capitulation into this collective doctrinal madness that the main cohort find themselves in.

One stand out thing about the way this novel is written is that it withholds in such a precise way as to make the setting slightly implacable temporally. It is ostensibly set around the 1970s, but our protagonists travail around in horse and carriage, invoke old blood sensibilities, have absolutely slammer old-timey naming conventions as to alienate themselves so distinctly from the motor vehicles, cold war broodings and mid-late 20th century capitalism that they find themselves enmeshed in. The enemy is Washington and it is so disgustingly /modern/.

Obviously the vocabulary is so indulgent that it almost comes across as a direct challenge from the author to the reader. Any paragraph can have up to 10 or so words that I have never read before. I stopped keeping track of them after several dozen in less than 100 pages, lol. Evidently though this is another amazing aspect of the quality of writing contained therein.

Some thoughts on my edition (Corona/Samizdat). The type setting was something, almost non existent margins and quite small text. Felt much longer than the 600 or so pages it clocked to. Unfortunately some editing errors (?) such as missing full stops at the end of paragraphs, or a random comma intersecting a word somewhere towards the end. Great cover though and super high quality paper.

Anyway it's good whatever buy it help out independent publishers and writers or at the very least if you like good books.

[Sunnyckf · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is my very first book review. I hope I manage to do a halfway decent job of it, and please forgive any inaccuracies or misreading of this excellent debut novel: A Bended Circuity, by Mr. Robert S. Stickley.

I wrote it partly because of the author’s campaign to bolster the book’s Goodread page; and yes, Mason & Dixon is my favorite Pynchon, so my motive is not entirely selfless. I also really like A Bended Circuity. No point, in my opinion, to review a book one has no love for, unless one is a professional book reviewer.

I shy away from writing a book review all this time because there exists this dilemma involving the subject. I guess what I’m most uncomfortable with is to act as judge and jury on the quality of a work of art.

You can never fully convince someone else about the level of excellence of a piece of artistic expression you have just experienced and am very excited about. I’d rather reach out to the author of said work of art personally to profess my admiration. And that was what I did.

In the course of our conversation through social media, I gained a deeper insight into one of the novel’s more interesting characters, as well as certain aspects of the novel’s theme, particularly several sub-chapters with the same enigmatic narrator, while leaving room for interpretations of my own.

I would also suggest the feature interview the author did with Beyond the Zero podcast which is available online in their December 2022 newsletter (dated November 30, 2022).

This review is mostly informed by my conversation with the author and also the aforementioned interview. I am not going to do a thorough summary of the novel nor put in any excerpts of the many exquisite and well-written passages because so many of my well-read peers here have done excellent jobs in that regard in their respective reviews.

To begin with, I supposed one would notice fairly early on from the beautiful opening paragraph that this is a very dense novel. Densely written and constructed with a dense array of high vocabulary.

Normally, I would be put off by a novel with big words, but this one gives off a different feel. And I am a reader who goes with my feeling. I’m not very knowledgeable and not very well-read in a wide range of subjects. As a result, I do get far less in return from my reading materials compared to other readers.

All I have is my feeling and instinct. I trust them implicitly. So, I soldiered on. Living in this time and age is also instrumental since a dictionary now is practically the light rectangular device in your hand instead of a thick heavy bundle of pages you have to chug around in addition to the equally thick novel you are reading.

The density of obscure words somehow felt necessary to the novel instead of being there just to show how intelligent the writer is. Plus, I really get to enrich my vocabulary powers while enjoying some of the most beautiful prose from a book in years.

The novel is divided into eight main sections. Each section contains as few as two chapters to as many as four chapters, with the exception of the final section which only has one epilogue chapter. There are altogether 21 chapters including the epilogue. Each chapters are further divided into varying numbers of sub-chapters, each concentrating on a specific character, supporting character or event.

The eccentrically named characters cannot help but recall to readers the immediate influence of Pynchon while the plot itself which is set in a roughly one year period circa 1969/1970 is an exercise in absurdist satire that begs the possibility everything might have actually happened in a truth is stranger than fiction kind of way.

One of the great characters forming the Cartesian axes of X, Y and Z around which the plot of the novel revolves is a Russian madman and secretly rogue KGB spy called Maxim Dyxov. A Pynchonian Russian name if there ever was one.

Dyxov’s obsession in bringing his increasingly unhinged ‘social experiment’ stateside is granted when he was picked for a covert KGB operation to recover a lost US nuclear missile. This sets the ball rolling for the crazy events in the novel.

It is not difficult to see Dyxov as being a mirror counterpoint to Bradley Pincnit (what did I say about Pynchon’s influence on the character names), the novel’s other axis character and the catalyst of the uprising (as a direct result of Dyxov’s machination) that forms the gist of the novel, a doomed uprising from the onset which soon spiral out of control in a most spectacular and darkly hilarious way.

It is unavoidable, inevitable even, for readers to compare the character of Pincnit, in both his characterization and actions, to the 45th President of the United States. Although the novel was completed well before Trump’s upset victory in the 2016 election, the resemblance speaks volume to the state of the world we are living in today.

Notwithstanding is the fact that the author intends for Pincnit to represent the presidents before Trump, namely W. Bush and Obama, and the effects of the “warmongering moves” they “were making more than anything else “.

By charting the course of Pincnit’s character arc in the novel, I have come to the conclusion regardless of whether it is the author’s intention or not, for him (Pincnit) to be a fascinating representation and study in the merging of the great sins on which the American dream was built on, namely the purging of the indigenous people and black slavery, with humanity’s prevalent evil from colonialism (the white man’s burden) to Nazism, Fascism and everything in between.

It is a fascinating thesis that may not have fully succeeded but remains a testament to the vast ambition of this novel.

As fascinating as Pincnit is, I return again and again to Dyxov, perhaps my favorite character in the book. There is so much to unpack in this deceptively single-note character. For instance, could it be psychologically possible for a madman to have that clarity of awareness that he himself is insane? Not going insane but already in the early throes of insanity.

And calling him the mirror counterpart to Pincnit is not an exaggeration because as one delves deeper into the novel, it becomes rather apparent that both Dyxov and Pincnit are two peas in a pod.

It is the similarity one sees in the mirror’s reflection, similar but slightly skewed, whereby the right hand becomes the left, the left hand becomes the right, and so on and so forth. It even extends to the racial prejudices of both characters.

Arriving at this understanding completely truncates the reader’s initial understanding of the Dyxov character, most prominently in the final conversation between Dyxov and the self-defeated Pincnit near the end of the novel during the latter’s train journey back to Pincnit Plantation and Marigold Manor.

From being the agent of chaos that sets things in motion, Dyxov, after the dust has settled, has ironically become the unlikely moral center of the story, or something as close to a moral center as we will get.

Which almost seems like a glaring flaw that there are far less scenes with Dyxov than I would have preferred. It almost feels as if there are a corpuscular of Dyxov scenes surgically removed from the final product, although the author has clarified that all the Dyxov scenes he wrote made it into the book.

The real flaw in an otherwise perfect novel, as far as I am concerned, concerns the third of the novel’s Cartesian axes of core characters, its sole female protagonist. Naming her Gabuirdine is probably the author’s way of suggesting there is a solid and firm fabric underneath the fragile exterior of the long suffering Mrs. Pincnit.

Trapped in an abusive and toxic marriage, Gabuirdine’s sub-chapters are the most stream-of-consciousness heavy narrative in the entire novel.

It is understandable given the male-centric context of the novel, with outrageous side characters like the Giant Penis and a cock fight scene that is literally ‘cock’ as in ‘dick’, that it would be extremely lacking in female representation; but having Gabuirdine as the sole female representation with other supporting female characters regulated to the sideline, she would have to be a mighty compelling character with a very strong presence.

In terms of presence, the author did a good job of making Gabuirdine a constant specter hovering over Pincnit’s proceedings, even in sub-chapters of the book which she did not appear.

However, the sub-chapters that were focused specifically on Gabuirdine and her thoughts left me wanting. The stream-of-consciousness technique bears a strong resemblance to the famous Penelope monologue final chapter of Ulysses. It is well written too, but unfortunately, Gabuirdine is only one woman and thus her thoughts and struggles are limited to hers alone. In a big novel of almost 600 pages, they soon grow repetitive.

Having another female voice to support Gabuirdine’s as well as provide an alternative female perspective would have been far more enriching.

Furthermore, instead of shining more light on Gabuirdine and her origin, these monologues only serve to make her more enigmatic with only her end motivation to break away from Pincnit’s cycle of abuse being clear. This for me did not add anything to her character but instead made it more simplistic and thin.

It certainly needs to be underlined that the author succeeds in illustrating the violence perpetuated on women through Pincnit’s treatment of Gabuirdine, which can sometimes be hard to stomach, but the enigma of Gabuirdine’s character makes it difficult to fully empathize with her and almost derailed any satisfaction derived from her finally getting the better of him in a bittersweet denouement at the end.

So much so that Gabuirdine is overshadowed in the end by a hidden fourth cog in the wheel, one Stafford Notering, an orphaned servant child, who is the product of a forbidden secret and plays a far more impactful role in wrapping up Pincnit’s arc by influencing the final grisly decision that defy Pincnit as someone far more sinister than an entitled egotistical narcissistic misogynistic racist Southern white male.

The length that Pincnit is willing to go to bury the secret that intertwined him in blood with Notering culminated in two horrifying climax, one of murderous violence and the other of bodily mutilation, both of which is a barely disguised metaphor of the length that America (or white America specifically) is willing to go to bury the shame of its original sin rather than bravely confronting it in the service of preserving the old way for the next generation.

A bloody treatise on how the universal evil inherent in men is kept alive and passed down from generations untold. It has essentially become not just the story of America’s original sin, embodied in one Bradley Pincnit and this depiction of his American south, but also of the original sin that has stained the whole of humanity from since the beginning of humanity’s time on earth.

This is but one such example of old sin being renewed for the young. A general description of a uniquely singular game called Tallyho Shadowland not long after the start of the novel has already laid the groundwork for the novel’s obsession with this theme of sin as generational torch passing. A metaphor laden children’s game of whispered dark desires and action mimicry of such as a means of grooming or training of the younger generation in ready acceptance of sexual and moral corruption as an already pre-determined way of southern life or tradition.

This novel is a first I’ve read that attempts to frame this interesting concept of original sin, not just of a nation or humanity, but the first true original sin as depicted in the Book of Genesis, as a living character by way of Milton.

Threaded through the novel are sub-chapters written in the style of church sermons given by an unnamed narrator. These sub-chapters are some of the only sub-chapters with titles. The sermons are in the whiplash fire and brimstone style, directly contemplating events in the sub-chapters preceding it. As if the narrator is an omnipotent observer or rather someone with a through line into Pincnit’s inner circle.

At first, one is led to suspect that the sermonic narrator is Pincnit’s trusted preacher-mentor, the robustly named Fantting. The epilogue chapter however, successfully delivered a coup-de-grace. The only sermon sub-chapter that the author left deliberately untitled, it started off innocently enough like other regular epilogues, offering final glimpses on the fate of Pincnit and those associated with him.

The author has said he intended for the novel to leave readers with a bad taste in their mouth, and the first two third of the epilogue did just that, implying that Pincnit and co will just about escape with minimal consequences for the troubles they have roust. What’s more, it is also implied that the staunchest loyalists may even become the pillars of America’s corporate economy in the coming years.

Then in the last third, the rug is pulled from our feet. A natural transition in the narrative that doesn’t even required any sub-chapter breaks, it is gradually revealed to us that the entire epilogue is but part of a sermon. What’s more, the level of omniscience regarding the ultimate fate of the rabble rousers clearly ruled out Fantting as the narrator of these sermons.

For the first time, we have a palpable indication of just how ancient the narrator is. Omniscient and ancient, the most obvious candidate that comes to mind given the willingness of the novel to mix realism with surrealism in the past 500 plus pages, is the former Morning Star, Lucifer or Satan himself.

Through my conversation with the author, he said that I’m one of two readers (at the time) suggesting that the narrator was Satan. But I did propose an alternative theory that the narrator might be the original sin itself, portrayed here as the allegorical character of an all-knowing preacher laying out his sermon. Just like how Milton, in Paradise Lost, portrayed sin as an allegorical character met by Satan himself at the Gates of Hell.

The more I reread the epilogue the more this seems a plausible answer to me. I guess it is true when they say trust in the art, not the artist. Although the saying was coined to illustrate a whole different context altogether.

The chief reason of my seeing this narrator as being an allegorical character is due to the fact that ‘he’ mentioned being related to the Tar Baby as ‘cousins’. The Tar Baby, a lifeless confection from the American folk tale of the old South designed to entrap trickster animals, wrought as a symbol of a difficult unsolvable situation. Miraculously given life in this novel as an allegory of the trickster figure itself, a deity of the tricksters if you will.

The idea that man (and woman) are unable to turn away from sin because it has always been imprinted into their being, what science now identified as DNA so to speak, as an explanation for all the unspeakable evils committed in the micro context of a nation and locality, and the macro context of life in general is very enticing and pessimistic.

But the final paragraphs do leave the door open for optimism. I interpret it as the incorporation of free will into the mix. Yes, we are forever cursed by the inevitability of sin, and yet we are able to choose whether to commit a sin, when to commit a sin, or better yet, the purpose or motive in our choosing to commit a sin; which could essentially make a big difference as to our commitment to lead a decent life as human beings.

The novel is solidly backed up by a great cast of supporting characters from Dyxov’s team of Renegados/Compatriotas misfits from the Cantil Cantina, Pincnit’s Junto of Condign Men, sad tragic Bartholomew, doomed Igor, the crew of the trawler The Restitution, Weatherford Coriolis, Glen Toxin; and the list goes on.

The author also showcases his mastery of different form of narrative styles including farce, propaganda, poems and a brilliant foray into gothic southern horror. The tale of a night journey like no other featuring the first appearance of the Tar Baby, the same Tar Baby that later brought clarity to Bartholomew, Pincnit’s best friend, forcing Pincnit into a decision that hasten his own unraveling.

Every great novel have an excellent sense of place and locale. This one continues the rich tradition with a tremendous feel of the American south, particularly Charleston. The tour-de-force writing that highlights the various iconic locale in Charleston under attack from the Renegados in the first phase of their war prank, during a hurricane no doubt, captures perfectly what it feels to be in the American south.

This only progresses deeper when Pincnit made the ill advised march with his ‘army’ further south to gather more recruitment before turning back up north towards their perceived enemy in Washington.

A glance at the ten books the author selected for his Desert Island book list in the interview with Beyond the Zero podcast, it is evident that he managed to impressively pack much of his literary influences into his debut novel.

There is the realism of Anna Karenina; the modernist sensibility and quirkiness of Dickinson and Eliot; the epicness of LotR; the encyclopedic ambition of Moby-Dick, the farcical satire of The Satyricon; the complex moral and religious conundrum of Paradise Lost; Shakespeare; the denseness and looping fluidity of Proust; and of course enough high vocabulary to make the Dictionary proud.

A Bended Circuity is a maximalist novel of the highest order. It is encyclopedic; contains various themes and genres, literary techniques and styles; and floods the readers with a deluge of information from a variety of subject matters.

Is it a masterpiece? As a first novel, yes. As a southern novel, ditto. As a literary masterpiece, no. Calling this novel a literary masterpiece does a disservice, I feel, to the author’s immense talent. It acknowledges that the author is already at his peak and there’s no other way but down from here. With a talent and gift as big as this, it is almost a given that the author will go on to top this debut novel. And a magnum opus is definitely in the cards.

This review has gone on longer than I anticipated. I can only hope that it is not a lot of misinformation and bloated gas.

Next time, if I ever do write another book review, I promise to contain my admiration and keep it straight to the point. Until then this has been a joy.

Thank you for listening.

Sunny
April 29, 2023

[Dante Nathanael · Rating 4 out of 5]

"... I want to experience the end of Capitalism, I want to see the human species progress."

And certainly this book can imprint this sentiment as one of your foremost desires; catapult, after myriads of realizations, of reconsiderations and of finding what is your position on their selfish deluded Way, the ringing need of bringing the end of all this, and seeing, living, breathing something, if not better, fair, true evolution past the cycle of dressed-up enslavement and, as we say here on the south of the South, "atole con el dedo".

RSS opens this tale of made up war —and what human war isn't?— in a confusing and anachronistic South Carolina at the end of the 60's. Language is one of the first hurdles one has to jump in reading this novel, a roadblock that feels constructed by the need to reinstate an old order, the "True Way", one which even the narrator is a hired actor who's in the plot of this frankly ridiculous and comedic story. But, at the end of the day, stories reflect the world in its many registers, and this book picks the necessary ones for one to laugh away the probable tears againt the ludicrous flow of Capitalism —who is probably as much a main character as the United States is.

Traversing through the swampwords and the dictionary marshes, one is able to find Pynchonian named characters who have the most thought provoking of conversations: a man seeking a bomb with an experiment in mind, a physical jokery shadow entity, a renowed cock champion turned mountain, and one of the many embodiments of greed and self entitlement who thinks loves his wife so much that he'd kill for her but gives only superficial kisses to. As the story advances, by these people being the protagonists, everything only seems to be going backwards , like their horses.

Despite all... maybe because I'm not familiarized at all with the geography or the history of the US's Uppers, only their "revolutions". Maybe because I couldn't find a sound gripping point to anchor myself and plunge into the subtext. Maybe just because one cannot hold the book and a dictionary at the same time while travelling to and from their Capitalism-abler work... Despite all the frankly funny passages, the all out excellently written action scenes, I couldn't bring myself to give this a 5 star... but that doesn't mean I don't recommend it, or that is is very far off from the crown.

And in all, even though it is RSS' first published novel, it already has all the qualities for it to be considered a work coming from a very mature artist, and I'm hoping to see more of their work.

[Bill B · Rating 4 out of 5]

I want to classify this book as a satirical farce, but maybe it just perfectly captures the reality of how farcical the political system of America is. Sure this story takes place in 1969 but as other reviews have stated it feels very relevant to today.

It is an incredibly well written story that had me laughing out loud in multiple sections. I found it hard to parse the story from the language in a few parts, but this was probably one of the more difficult books I’ve completed. The main issue I had was I HATED the main character, Bradley. I do acknowledge we’re supposed to hate Bradley and his Junto of jagoffs, but that doesn’t make me want to spend any more time with him. I loved all of Dyxov and the “Renegados”parts and at a few points was hoping the narrative would go back to them.

I’m not sure I could recommend this book to any friends or family(their loss) but I would 100% recommend it to anyone interested in reading big, complex, phenomenally written books. I will definitely be looking for more works from this author!

[Zach · Rating 1 out of 5]

Horribly overwritten. Almost every sentence is gratingly convoluted. There may be something here that a great editor could bring out, but it would require a massive cut. The hint of good writing is buried deep in a clutter of overwrought phrases and clauses. And I’m not lazy or averse to complex narratives. DFW and Pynchon are two of my favourite authors; comparing them to this is like night and day. The sentences these great authors use are at times complex but they are never clogged down with nonsensically elaborate phrasing; i.e. unlike A Bended Circuitry, they don’t convey a very simple idea in excruciating, drawn-out language; if the idea is simple, the happening straightforward, you say it, plain and simple, and it is the accumulation of ideas and happenings that brings complexity: not the other way around where the reader is asked to appreciate one simple concept or occurrence by reading ten or one hundred superfluous words. Editors aren’t always important, but if anything were to come of this draft a heavy handed edit would have been crucial.

[Joseph Brady · Rating 5 out of 5]

First time reviewer. The book still swirls my thoughts and an attempt at articulating seems somewhat foolish. But finding incentive beyond mere praise, I will add some initial impressions, with the hope to add more at a later point.

Not being from the South, or from the U.S even, I had anticipated some cultural estrangement, but living in a country that has recently exited a union, I soon found an oddly familiar landscape. The weirdness that descends our present realities, the agitation by obscurely motivated foreign entities, the gravity of hubris, and the willingness to allow charisma to surpass reason.

RSS takes us on a circuitous path utilising archaic language to describe events set at the tail end of the 60s, that speaks clearly to socio-political issues of today. A dense and brilliant, hilarious, absurd, and prescient text. I will be re-reading ABC, and looking forward to everything that RSS puts out in the future.

[Kieran Forster · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow! A truly sui generis reading experience! Highly original dissociative experience of time distortion, historical mindmelding and toward the end, profound and overt philosophical exposition by an important character in a special landscape! Again this book is full of “characters” that could well be an old mansion or a swamp…. I loved that. Its dissociative and weakens the left hemisphere’s analytical determination to “understand everything “… good luck with that here. I loved that ABC was circuitous enough to avoid the boredom of easy analysis. Without any hint of hyperbole, this is an instant and future classic. The density is much like the density of Conrad… in other words, it’s one of those things you recall with affection much later. One of the great books I’ve read in the last 5 years.

[isaacq · Rating 5 out of 5]

i have rarely felt less equipped to write a review on goodreads. my sad lowercase hoser vernacular feels woefully ill-suited to praise this tower of a novel. even among its cousins, the most excellent of the corona\samizdat novels, it stands atop its own podium. if the plot summary sounds at all like something you'd be interested in, you owe it to yourself to order this novel, wait for it to arrive and then DO THE WORK. don't get me wrong, ABC is a hugely fun read, but it also reserves its biggest pleasures for the reader who's prepared to spend a good deal of time with each dense paragraph, savouring the onslaught of ideas. N.B. i guarantee you will need (and appreciate) having a dictionary on-hand.

[Paul Dembina · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a fun if sometimes tiring read. This reads as a Pynchon-esque quixotic (ha!) quest wherein a bigoted Southern Gentleman decides to take up arms against "Northerners". Things do not turn out as expected!

Reading progress is somewhat delayed by the use of a large number of archaic and/or unusual words.

[Nick Voro · Rating 5 out of 5]

*** Review Forthcoming ***

[Brent Hayward · Rating 5 out of 5]

Incredibly good. Mind-blowing. Look at the other raves here and know they are truth. (Why there’s not a bigger splash out there remains one of those mysteries. Stupid ol’ world.) The prose is erudite, beautiful, dense, and, at times, (weirdly) funny. The MAGA-relevant, post cold war story gets heavier and more disconcerting as it progresses. I sat moved many times. I read, reread, marveled. I don’t know what else to say. A book for anyone who picks up books, almost obsessively, hoping to find some surprising fictional sweetspot that resonates profoundly and reaches inside you to tweak your chemistry for the better. Doesn’t happen often-- Dhalgren; The Recognitions; Life: a User’s Manual-- but ABC will do this.

[Casey · Rating 2 out of 5]

Stickley's novel is intelligent, occasionally funny, and challenging—but too often challenging in an exasperating way. It's hopelessly overwritten. Only a few times over the final two hundred pages does the writing feel like it's not merely spinning the narrative wheels without the necessary weight or traction to cause any actual movement, which made reading this feel like a chore. Yet, like I said, it is intelligent. Stickley's vocabulary is particularly impressive, and he can spin some wonderful prose:

"These men are all connected, sharing in a purchased history though some of them didn't so much as recognize one another's existence on the earth. Not every man deserves the reputation of his forefathers though these men might, as they are here, tonight, at this gathering. These are the plantation heritors. These are the Uppers, people whose fortunes had been made for them through the resource of free labor so many years before they were born, and still those old funds siphoned into their coffers."

And despite the bulk of this book being far heavier than it had any right to be, I certainly laughed. The late skirmish against the hippies stands out to me as Stickley's humor at its best, displaying the colorful absurdity of the situation.

I don't know...there could have been a great book here, a great 300-ish page book instead of a questionable 600 page book. Maybe it just wasn't for me, although I admire the ambition, misapplied as I felt it to be.

[Joe Stuffins · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mr Stickley is truly a modern master of the written word; his unique lexicon has such precision and care that in turn creates prose that is beautiful and experimental in equal measure.

This is one of those novels it’s best to enter totally blind but without giving too much away; it is set against the backdrop of a neo-Confederate uprising in the late 1960s/early 1970s and the travails of its main participants and their families and friends. Don’t be put off by the bleak picture this insufficient description conjures as the story constantly dips and weaves through wonderful absurdism, thought provoking social commentary and genuine human moments.

As a Brit, some of the references required a bit of external reading, but I was constantly rewarded for my time spent both in the book and researching.

I would echo some of my fellow reviewers here in hoping this novel finds the large audience it deserves and look forward to Mr Stickley’s future works.

[Arun Joseph · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just finished this masterpiece.
What a stunning prose! Right from the opening lines “In this place, outside elements are rendered useless” to the fitting epilogue.
I was left wondering if in one way or the other we are all Uncle Bradley.
So many memorable moments - the funny but melancholic chapter on Igor, the battle of the shade and of course, the Tarbaby…
One of my favorite lines - “war may be the best analogue for the sadist’s missed orgasm”