The Terrible - (American Literature) by Michael Bible (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

From the celebrated author of Little Lazarus, Michael Bible's The Terrible moves between one man's imagined memories of a past life as Ivan the Terrible's brother, and his more recent recollections as a father careening through modern American society.

The Terrible unfolds in the space between confession and delusion as our narrator, the self-proclaimed brother of Ivan the Terrible, Yuri Vasilievich, is arrested and questioned for an unnamed "incident" in the parking lot of Twisted Oak Steakhouse in Harmony, North Carolina. Rather than explain what happened, he offers a meandering, occasionally mythic, and often hilarious account of his life. He claims to have been born in 1532 in Russia and is the younger brother of the Russian Tzar. He recounts frozen bear attacks, boyars ripped apart by dogs, a lifelong obsession with dandies and silks, and then pivots to modern day to his assault of a Captain America impersonator in Times Square.

Throughout the novel, the Russian past and the American present blur. Our narrator's mental health deteriorates, or perhaps sharpens. But the emotional truth of his stories--his longing for love, his guilt as a parent, his isolation inside his own mind--cuts through even his most absurd digressions.

About the Author

Michael Bible is the author of five novels. Sophia (2015), Empire of Light (2018), The Ancient Hours (2020) from Melville House Books, Little Lazarus (2025) from Clash Books, and The Terrible, forthcoming from Dalkey Archive Press in 2026. His novels The Ancient Hours and Little Lazarus were both bestsellers in Italy with the publisher Adelphi Editions. He's the screenwriter of the feature film Dogleg, streaming on MUBI. His fiction and nonfiction can be seen in The Oxford American, The Baffler, Paris Review Daily, New York Tyrant, Forever Magazine, Southwest Review, BBC Radio, The Guardian, Joyland, and LA Review of Books among others. His novels have been featured in The New York Times, The Believer, NPR, Esquire Italia, and Vanity Fair Italia among others. He received an MFA from The University of Mississippi under the mentorship of the writer Barry Hannah and was a writer's assistant for screenwriter David Milch. Born in North Carolina, he lives in New York City.