"[Zoe Heller] is an extraordinarily entertaining writer, and this novel showcases her copious gifts, including a scathing, Waugh-like wit."--New York Times
Best-selling author Zoe Heller has followed up the critical and commercial success of What Was She Thinking? Notes on a Scandal with another tour-de-force on the meaning of faith, belief, and trust: The Believers. Tragic and comic, witty and intense, The Believers is the story of a dysfunctional family forced by tragedy to confront their own personal demons. In the vein of Claire Messud and Zadie Smith, Zoe Heller has written that rare novel that tackles the big ideas without sacrificing page-turning readability.
About the Author :
Zoë Heller is the author of Everything You Know and What Was She Thinking? Notes on a Scandal, which was short-listed for the Man Booker Prize and made into an acclaimed film starring Cate Blanchett and Judi Dench. Heller lives in New York.
Review :
"[Heller] is an extraordinarily entertaining writer, and this novel showcases her copious gifts, including a scathing, Waugh-like wit; an unerring ear for the absurdities of contemporary speech; and a native-born Brit's radar for class and status distinctions . . . combined with her hilarious evocation of the radical-chic world the Litvinoffs inhabit, her understanding of the Darwinian mathematics of familial politics . . . makes the reader look forward to her next foray into fiction." - Michiko Kakutani, New York Times
"With her arcing wit and searing characters, Zoë Heller is quickly becoming one of the sharpest novelists in America. . . . It's a testament to her respect for the full spectrum of human nature that her fiercely drawn characters endure satiric exposure that would burn weaker ones to a crisp. . . . All of these moments, even the most painful ones, constantly vibrate with Heller's wit, her steely attention to our delicate egos and desperate longings. Somewhere between the novels of Allegra Goodman and Claire Messud, The Believers charts out a terrain all its own. If you haven't read Heller yet, prepare to be converted." - Ron Charles, Washington Post Book World
"Paints a family portrait so rich and full, it seems at times that the characters are living and breathing on the page." - Lisa Orkin Emmanuel, Associated Press
"Absorbing. . . . Funny and sad at the same time. . . . The Believers brims with clever dialogue. . . . A compelling tale of familial self-discovery." - Jill Abramson, New York Times
"A moving, deeply intelligent look at intellectual loyalties-to ideology, religion, family-and the humans attached to them. This is a wonderful novel." - Joseph O'Neill, author of Netherland
"A beautiful, oftentimes hilarious, razor-precise portrait of a family, a city, and an examination of the eternal and universal urge to embrace something, anything, greater than ourselves." - Richard Price, author of Lush Life
"Tough, wise and funny. . . . A sustaining, intelligent novel about how the big questions affect and change all our small lives." - Anne Enright, author of The Gathering
"Profoundly satisfying. . . . Heller injects that difficult-to-pinpoint something-or-other that elevates soap opera to art. . . . The Believers pulses with . . . something deep and lasting and larger than mere story." - Lionel Shriver, author of The Post-Birthday World
"Heller's sensitivity to the ways attitudes evolve and persist--her understanding that belief is a process--elevates the characters above their petty squabbles and textbook arguments, helping to explain their behavior while refusing to excuse it. . . . Moving and unsettling--and surprisingly entertaining." - Eryn Loeb, San Francisco Chronicle
"A scathing social comedy. . . . Her dialogue never loses its keen bite and the story moves along with the unstoppable force of an express train." - Allison Lynn, People (3 1/2 out of 4 stars)
"This searing comic novel takes on hypocrisy of all kinds. . . . Heller's talent lies in the way she illuminates her characters, often with dazzling insight, without making excuses or offering redemption." - The New Yorker
"Heller's writing is sharp and edgy. . . . In creating such a vivid, appallingly funny family, Heller . . . again proves herself a masterful chronicler of domestic drama." - Donna Freydkin, USA Today
"Literature that is not just enjoyable but also ultimately moving and affirmative. . . . Her satirical portrait of the Litvinoffs -- deracinated, secular Jewish leftists -- bears faint echoes of early Philip Roth. But compared with her first two novels, Heller's scathing irony is tempered--or enriched--in The Believers by her daring, in an age of cynicism, to write about people desperate for something to believe in. Her characters arouse our sympathy as they struggle between rationalism and faith. . . . At once a novel of ideas, manners and morals, The Believers is an energetic tragicomedy with the bite not just of cynicism, but also heartfelt feelings." - Heller McAlpin, Los Angeles Times
"Sharply etched. . . . In its concerns and its style, The Believers most closely resembles Zadie Smith's On Beauty, but it has a cooler heart. What makes the The Believers work is its precision and accuracy." - Laura Miller, salon.com
"A book about a family, and a terrific one. . . . Heller's ability to describe many things in one observation is almost acrobatic. . . . She comes at all her subjects from unexpected angles, with a quick, glancing touch, but even more than the deftness and surprise in her descriptions, it is this remarkable ability to look both in at and out from her characters simultaneously that makes her work so identifiable, so commanding, and, so often, so devastating. . . . Heller's satire is surprisingly fresh. But perhaps most important of all, the sharpness of her mordant intelligence and wit is always shadowed by a strange beauty." - Cathleen Schine, The New York Review of Books
"A moving, deeply intelligent look at intellectual loyalties--to ideology, religion, family--and the humans attached to them. This is a wonderful novel." - Joseph O'Neill, author of Netherland
"In The Believers Zoë Heller offers us The [Town] House of Litvinoff, New York left wing royalty, as they scramble in all directions for faith, any kind of faith, in the post modern age of cynicism and moral despair. A beautiful, oftentimes hilarious, razor-precise portrait of a family, a city, and an examination of the eternal and universal urge to embrace something, anything, greater than ourselves. " - Richard Price, author of Lush Life
