Hey Jack! (First Edition)

Hannah, Barry

ISBN 10: 0525245588 / ISBN 13: 9780525245582

Published by E. P. Dutton/Seymour Lawrence (New York), 1987

About this Item

New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1987. First edition, first printing, with full number line including the 1. Hardcover. Quarter red cloth over white paper-covered boards with gilt spine lettering. Fine in a fine dust jacket. Publisher's original price of $15.95 intact on jacket flap. Comes with archival-quality mylar dust jacket protector. A tight, clean copy. Octavo, 133 pages. Brown endpapers. A short novel and Barry Hannah's seventh book, published at the height of his literary powers following "Ray" and "The Tennis Handsome." Hannah was a National Book Award finalist for "Geronimo Rex.".

Seller Inventory # Fiction-Hannah-2

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Hey Jack! (First Edition)
• Publisher: E. P. Dutton/Seymour Lawrence (New York)
• Publication Date: 1987
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0525245588
• ISBN 13: 9780525245582
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: 1st Edition
• Condition: Fine
• Dust Jacket Condition: Fine

About this title

Synopsis

A Southern odyssey revolving around Gramps, a hypochondriacal professor, a rock star, redneck Southerners, Korean veterans, and Jack, an old cafe owner whose friendship with Homer, the narrator, anchors the story

Reviews

In this slender new novel by the author of Airships, the story line advances casually, but in Hannah's wonderfully original, distinctive fashion. The setting is a sleepy Mississippi college town, where there is lots of time for tennis and gossip. The narrator, Homer, is 56, a veteran of Korea, literate and enviously well off. He spends hours at a time with his friend Jack, a cafe owner, talking, for the most part, about the debauched local rock star, Ronnie Foot. Nothing about Ronnie is good, but the worst thing he has done is take up with Jack's daughter, the schoolteacher Alice. Much of what goes on herelust, violence and eccentricityis familiar in Southern literature. There is nothing hackneyed, though, in Hannah's telling. The story and characters are brought into sharp focus by the resonant imagery. From Homer's vibrant new wife, with "hair charging blond from her head," to the black-comedy description of the Foot mansion, every word is fresh and precise. Hannah's wry voice is spellbinding.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Hannah's latest novel (others include The Tennis Handsome, LJ 3/1/83) is the chronicle of a friendship that thrives amidst the lunacy and tragi-comic violence of a small Mississippi town. The narrator, Homer, is a Korean war veteran who has become a successful writer. His friend Jack is a former war correspondent, sheriff, college professor, and farmer who now runs a small cafe. Since both men have already been crazy, they can readily understand the madness of those all around them. Seeking love that can restore, Hannah's characters frequently fall prey to passions that destroy. The book contains striking proof of Hannah's verbal ingenuity, but his story is disappointingly sparse. He provides intriguing characters and anecdotes but little sustained narrative. Albert E. Wilhelm, English Dept., Tennessee Technological Univ., Cookeville
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc.