Yeats Is Dead!
Edited by Joseph O'Connor
Knopf/$23
What would you do to get your hot little hands on the only known copy of James Joyce's last, unpublished novel? Americans, well ... we'd probably ante a large amount of our almighty dollars. Dubliners, as proved in Yeats Is Dead!, will resort to far more severe — albeit sly and side-splitting — measures.
Fifteen of Ireland's most accomplished contemporary authors pooled their more-than considerable talents for this unforgettable mystery, going above, beyond and over the moon to create a tale that everyone can instantly adore, but only those of Irish descent can fully appreciate. Roddy Doyle, Gene Kerrigan Marian Keyes, Hugo Hamilton and Tom Humphries are among the storytellers putting their unique stamp on Yeats, with Angela's Ashes author, Frank McCourt, contributing the final hysterical chapter.
This little mystery's world is filled with crooked cops, evil old ladies, hapless down-and-outers and resourceful petty criminals, all scrabbling to posses Joyce's final magnum opus, Y8S=+! (Yeats Is Dead!). Character profiles and personalities alter slightly from author to author with hilarious results; victims become villains, lust becomes loathe and back again, heteros switch to homos, and Dublin is alternately the best and worst city in the world. This reader, however, is reticent to jump in the sack with any native: Shaving foam, Sellotape, a jar of lemon curd and a toner cartridge figure into some of the kinkier love scenes. None of the sex practices, however, can touch McCourt's hilarious, butt cheek trick, a funny-as-hell scenario involving a man's nose firmly tucked between a young woman's cheeks, driving her to ecstasy by peppering his sentences with lots of drawn-out, reverberating "Ms" ("They don't know that wommmen around the world from Bethlehemmm to Mmmadagascar clammmour for my hummm!")
Those looking for quick summer reads are used to sacrificing humor or intelligence for fewer pages. With Yeats Is Dead!, you get it all. And we'll bet you get several new favorite authors out of the deal.
—Kelli K
