So Far Gone - Large Print by Jess Walter (Paperback)

About the Book

"A reclusive journalist ... is suddenly thrown into a wild, suspenseful journey to rescue his kidnapped grandchildren"--

Book Synopsis

LARGE PRINT EDITION

"As talented a natural storyteller as is working in American fiction."--Washington Post

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Beautiful Ruins--and in the wild, propulsive spirit of Charles Portis' True Grit--comes a hilarious and brilliantly provocative adventure through life in modern America, about a reclusive journalist forced back into the world to rescue his kidnapped grandchildren.

A few weeks after the 2016 election, at Thanksgiving with his daughter's family, Rhys Kinnick snapped. After an escalating fight about politics, he hauled off and punched his conspiracy theorist son-in-law. Horrified by what he'd done, by the state of the country and by his own spiraling mental health, Rhys chucked his smartphone out a car window and fled for a cabin in the woods, off the grid and with no one around--except a pack of hungry raccoons.

Now, seven years later, Kinnick's old life is about to land right back on his crumbling doorstep. Can this failed husband and father, a man with no phone, no computer, and a car that barely runs, reemerge into a broken world to track down his missing daughter and save his sweet, precocious grandchildren from the members of a dangerous militia?

With the help of his caustic ex-girlfriend, a bipolar retired detective, and his only friend (who happens to be furious with him), Kinnick heads off on a madcap journey through cultural lunacy and the rubble of a life he thought he'd left behind. So Far Gone is a rollicking, razor-sharp, and ultimately moving road trip through a fractured nation, from a writer who has been called "a genius of the modern American moment" (Philadelphia Inquirer).

Review Quotes

"So Far Gone is a marvel--a taut literary thriller that is also a moving, deeply humane exploration of the way one family falls apart and puts itself back together in a moment of crisis. Jess Walter is a prodigiously talented novelist, a writer willing to confront some of the most important and divisive issues of our time without losing his nerve or his sense of humor. " - Tom Perrotta, New York Times bestselling author of The Leftovers
"The characters are created with loving care, the plot with reckless glee; Walter seems as fed up with various aspects of modern life as the smartphone-hating Rhys, and gives his version of the modern Northwest a distinctly Old West vibrational overlay....Walter is a beacon of wit, decency, and style." - Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"I loved this book, and marveled how Jess Walter managed to build such a warm, funny, loving novel out of so many horrible parts. It's an American original." - Ann Patchett, New York Times bestselling author of Tom Lake
"A tumultuous road trip through a tumultuous America."
- Washington Post, Books to Watch for in 2025
"Like Station Eleven and The Handmaid's Tale, this novel by Walter (The Angels of Rome and Other Stories) feels both prescient and timely yet with a backward glance....Gritty survivalist stories, from bunkers to bar rooms, converge in this propulsive novel that glances backward to 2016 while signaling what dangers come to fruition when people relinquish human bonds in favor of ideological fervor....This work is a tremendous achievement... with an urgency that may make it one of the strongest realist but dystopian novels of the present era." - Library Journal (starred review)
"There is both hurt and healing in So Far Gone in its depiction of both a society that can seem so far gone down the wrong road and people who want to do the right thing." - Daily Kos
"Jess Walter's 'So Far Gone' is so far, soooo good....A compelling tale of a broken America and the struggles of the everyday few to try and bring back some semblance of being united... This is a romp in the style of the best of Raymond Chandler or Dashiell Hammett, ....a noir style thriller that follows the conflict lived by every family that has gathered for Thanksgiving after 2015." - The Spokesman-Review
"Who better to give us the latest version of a recluse with a heart of gold than Walter? . . . It's a gleeful, kooky and tender homage to Charles Portis' True Grit with echoes of Tom Robbins and yes, Elinor Lipman too." - Los Angeles Times
"A tremendous achievement. . . . Like Station Eleven and The Handmaid's Tale, this novel by Walter feels both prescient and timely yet with a backward glance . . . with an urgency that may make it one of the strongest realist but dystopian novels of the present era." - Library Journal (starred review)
"Propulsive. . . . Walter serves up a rollicking and heartrending adventure about a broken man determined to set things right in an increasingly divided America. . . . This captivates." - Publishers Weekly (starred review)
"A buoyant, witty caper." - New York Times
"Jess Walter has done it again." - The Advocate
"A quick read--the kind you can definitely finish in a couple summer afternoons--Jess Walter's latest crackles with the author's wit, even whilst immersing itself in the thick of modern American woes. So Far Gone's protagonist...is pulled into a zany adventure (with an equally entertaining ensemble cast) as he attempts to bring his family back together." - Elle