Find a copy online
Links to this item
Find a copy in the library
Finding libraries that hold this item...
Details
Genre/Form: | Fiction Electronic books Domestic fiction |
---|---|
Additional Physical Format: | Print version: Lerner, Ben, 1979- Topeka school. New York : Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2019 (DLC) 2018060806 (OCoLC)1080555801 |
Material Type: | Document, Fiction, Internet resource |
Document Type: | Internet Resource, Computer File |
All Authors / Contributors: |
Ben Lerner |
ISBN: | 9780374721183 0374721181 9780771049330 0771049331 |
OCLC Number: | 1121593870 |
Description: | 1 online resource (282 pages) |
Responsibility: | Ben Lerner. |
Abstract:
From the award-winning author of 10:04 and Leaving the Atocha Station, a tender and expansive family drama set in the American Midwest at the turn of the century: a tale of adolescence, transgression, and the conditions that have given rise to the trolls and tyrants of the New Right. Adam Gordon is a senior at Topeka High School, class of '97. His mother, Jane, is a famous feminist author; his father, Jonathan, is an expert at getting "lost boys" to open up. They both work at a psychiatric clinic that has attracted staff and patients from around the world. Adam is a renowned debater, expected to win a national championship before he heads to college. He is one of the cool kids, ready to fight or, better, freestyle about fighting if it keeps his peers from thinking of him as weak. Adam is also one of the seniors who bring the loner Darren Eberheart-- who is, unbeknownst to Adam, his father's patient, into the social scene, to disastrous effect. Deftly shifting perspectives and time periods, The Topeka School is the story of a family, its struggles and its strengths: Jane's reckoning with the legacy of an abusive father, Jonathan's marital transgressions, the challenge of raising a good son in a culture of toxic masculinity. It is also a riveting prehistory of the present: the collapse of public speech, the trolls and tyrants of the New Right, and the ongoing crisis of identity among white men.
Reviews
User-contributed reviews
Add a review and share your thoughts with other readers.
Be the first.
Add a review and share your thoughts with other readers.
Be the first.


Tags
Add tags for "The Topeka school".
Be the first.