Joshua Ferris - The Unnamed

The Scotsman“A literal Ferris wheel for the reader...” Ferris keeps their plight too lightweight and fanciful to invite real empathy. It's too easy to shrug off what happens in The Unnamed without imagining that it could happen to you...

Economist“Seizes readers by the lapels...” Mr Ferris exercises a mature writer’s restraint, content to leave questions unanswered. He also has a fine ear for speech, and a good sense of what feels real, even when chronicling the surreal...

The Independent“Distressingly bleak rather than distastefully blithe...” The reader might be forgiven for wondering why it is they have just read 300-plus pages – unless they enjoy a good existential disquisition on despair, of course...

Guardian“At times an almost unbearable love story...” A kind of existential journey that is not wholly removed from Cormac McCarthy's The Road, though Ferris has none of McCarthy's apocalypticism...

The Times“Ferris feeds us tantalising clues...” Ferris is a fine writer and his talent shines fitfully through this novel’s heavy weather. But pleasure grows scarcer, and disappears completely as the book moves into its protracted final section...

The Telegraph“An important and individual work...” The audacity and dexterity on show make up for any flaws. The Unnamed can be tough to read because of the skill Ferris brings to his evocation of suffering, particularly in its final pitiless chapters...

Financial Times“Rapidly begins to suffer from implausibility...” Ferris is a brilliant writer of dark humour. Here he seems to have boiled off the humour and served up a bitter and unappetising sediment...

Publishers Weekly“A vastly satisfying and original book...” Ferris manages to inject a bizarre whimsy into a devastatingly sad story, with would-be happy endings spiraling back into chaos and then descending further...

The New York Times“Mr. Ferris writes prettily, too prettily” Mr. Ferris surely means to write charmingly of a man and wife who have been through endless shared battles with an unseen, undefinable threat.Yet he keeps their plight too lightweight and fanciful to invite real empathy.

The New Yorker“Brash, extravagant, and, near the end, chillingly beautiful...” The first half of the book reads like a shaggy-dog story, hobbled by a distracting murder subplot. But thesecond half is a stunner, an unnerving portrait of a man stripped of civilization’s defenses.