false http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1166585757m/14217.jpg 14217 6 The narrator of Donald Antrim's <I>The Verificationist</I> is a middle-aged psychotherapist who meets a handful of colleagues at a pancake house one evening to engage in the seemingly innocuous activity of socializing while eating stacks of fried batter. What commences is a psychosexual deadpan comedy fraught with academic grandstanding, subtle flirting, and lots of good eatin'. Before long, Tom decides to start a food fight, but is restrained in a bear hug by Bernhardt, the father figure of the group. Our hero then proceeds to have an out-of-body experience in which he eavesdrops on his cohorts and ruminates on such things as the very essence of the pancake: <blockquote> We eat pancakes to escape loneliness, yet within moments we want nothing more than our freedom from ever having so much as thought about pancakes. Nothing can prevent us, after eating pancakes, from feeling the most awful regret. After eating pancakes, our great mission in life becomes the repudiation of the pancakes and everything served along with them, the bacon and the syrup and the sausage and coffee and jellies and jams. But these things are beneath mention, compared with the pancakes themselves. It is the pancake--<I>Pancakes! Pancakes!</I>--that we never learn to respect. </blockquote> Antrim's prose, at home somewhere between the psychologist's couch and a diner's Naugahyde booth, follows this tack for just shy of 200 pages, without chapter or page breaks. Readers familiar with the writer's earlier novels, <I>The Hundred Brothers</I> and <I>Elect Mr. Robinson for a Better World</I>, will spot this as his preferred modus operandi. <p> Tom, likewise, follows in the tradition of Antrim's other narrators--a timid yet well-meaning intellectual training his considerable observational and confessional skills upon a tableau at once pathetically banal and rife with meaning. Antrim has a talent for creating characters who speak contemporary psychobabble that falls far short of explaining the absurdity of their dilemmas. Rebecca, the pulchritudinous teenage waitress, and Escobar, Tom's suave Mediterranean friend, not only play their hour upon stage with earnest precision but serve to accentuate Tom's essentially pitiful nature. While Antrim's cast this time out is considerably downsized (literally 100 brothers appeared in <I>The Hundred Brothers</I>), he remains a writer who delights in bouncing disparate characters off one another with hilarious, disastrous results. <p> In plumbing the pathologies of millennial manhood, <I>The Verificationist</I> is part Robert Bly men's retreat, part sex comedy, and part doctoral thesis. It is served up like a combo platter, best enjoyed in a single sitting, and undeniably tasty. <I>--Ryan Boudinot</I> 1845 2000 The Verificationist: A Novel total:190|5:33|4:70|3:52|2:26|1:9| 190 662 282 23 14217 0679769439 9780679769439 169 20 3.48 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1166585757m/14217.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14217.The_Verificationist_A_Novel 1 1 true Tue Jul 01 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Sun Feb 17 23:34:33 -0800 2008 Wed Jul 16 17:22:56 -0700 2008 more...]]> 14217 0679769439 9780679769439 169 20 3.48 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1166585757m/14217.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14217.The_Verificationist_A_Novel 4 0 false Tue Jun 02 12:20:20 -0700 2009 Tue Jun 23 15:19:17 -0700 2009 more...]]> 14217 0679769439 9780679769439 169 20 3.48 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1166585757m/14217.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14217.The_Verificationist_A_Novel 3 0 false Fri May 01 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Fri May 01 15:49:33 -0700 2009 Fri May 01 15:52:56 -0700 2009 Atmospheric Disturbances. She said it was her favorite book, if I remember correctly, and boy does it show. If you like one book, you'll probably like the other. The writing styles, themes, and even the plots are incredibly sim...more...]]> 14217 0679769439 9780679769439 169 20 3.48 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1166585757m/14217.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14217.The_Verificationist_A_Novel 4 0 false Sun Feb 24 00:05:33 -0800 2008 Fri Feb 29 23:38:30 -0800 2008 more...]]> 14217 0679769439 9780679769439 169 20 3.48 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1166585757m/14217.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14217.The_Verificationist_A_Novel 0 0 false Thu Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Tue Jan 27 20:26:33 -0800 2009 Tue Jan 27 20:35:28 -0800 2009 more...]]> 14217 0679769439 9780679769439 169 20 3.48 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1166585757m/14217.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14217.The_Verificationist_A_Novel 0 0 false Tue Jan 06 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Tue Jan 06 10:53:31 -0800 2009 Tue Jan 06 10:53:31 -0800 2009
"It was because I was intuitively aware that Escobar wanted to make love to my wife, and I was therefore reluctant to allow him access to her, even through me -- especially through me".

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Moe has radically remodeled his bar, and it is now filled with assorted eurotrash, yuppies and pseudo-hipsters. Homer and friends appear at the grand re-opening and are taken aback by the crowd and environ...more...]]> 500144 0375408223 9780375408229 18 3 3.48 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1175279730m/500144.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/500144.The_Verificationist 4 0 false Mon Oct 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Mon Oct 22 06:47:44 -0700 2007 Mon Oct 22 06:48:40 -0700 2007
The novella transpires over the course of a single fantastic scene in a pancake house and, despite metaphors runni...more...]]> 14217 0679769439 9780679769439 169 20 3.48 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1166585757m/14217.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14217.The_Verificationist_A_Novel 2 0 false Sat Jul 26 09:07:08 -0700 2008 Fri May 08 15:32:57 -0700 2009 more...]]> 14217 0679769439 9780679769439 169 20 3.48 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1166585757m/14217.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14217.The_Verificationist_A_Novel 2 0 false Wed Aug 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Thu Aug 23 11:31:45 -0700 2007 Sun Aug 26 07:11:40 -0700 2007 The Crying Of Lot 49, but it eventually develops an absurd rhythm of its own. The book actually ends up being more distressing and harrowing than it initially promises, as the r...more...]]> 500144 0375408223 9780375408229 18 3 3.48 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1175279730m/500144.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/500144.The_Verificationist 0 0 false Mon Jun 04 08:51:54 -0700 2007 Sat Dec 22 18:26:56 -0800 2007 14217 0679769439 9780679769439 169 20 3.48 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1166585757m/14217.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14217.The_Verificationist_A_Novel 0 0 false Wed Nov 28 21:10:26 -0800 2007 Sun Jan 04 21:16:42 -0800 2009 14217 0679769439 9780679769439 169 20 3.48 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1166585757m/14217.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14217.The_Verificationist_A_Novel 4 0 false Fri Oct 19 08:31:49 -0700 2007 Fri Oct 19 08:33:58 -0700 2007 14217 0679769439 9780679769439 169 20 3.48 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1166585757m/14217.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14217.The_Verificationist_A_Novel 5 0 false Fri May 23 11:32:49 -0700 2008 Fri May 23 11:34:15 -0700 2008 14217 0679769439 9780679769439 169 20 3.48 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1166585757m/14217.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14217.The_Verificationist_A_Novel 4 0 false Tue Oct 23 14:05:49 -0700 2007 Thu Nov 08 13:19:57 -0800 2007 500144 0375408223 9780375408229 18 3 3.48 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1175279730m/500144.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/500144.The_Verificationist 5 0 false Wed May 02 11:41:08 -0700 2007 Thu Aug 23 13:06:05 -0700 2007 14217 0679769439 9780679769439 169 20 3.48 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1166585757m/14217.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14217.The_Verificationist_A_Novel 4 0 false Wed Jun 20 05:48:47 -0700 2007 Wed Jun 20 05:49:22 -0700 2007 14217 0679769439 9780679769439 169 20 3.48 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1166585757m/14217.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14217.The_Verificationist_A_Novel 4 0 false Wed Dec 12 16:55:31 -0800 2007 Wed Dec 12 17:12:51 -0800 2007 14217 0679769439 9780679769439 169 20 3.48 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1166585757m/14217.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/14217.The_Verificationist_A_Novel 5 0 false Sun Sep 01 00:00:00 -0700 2002 Fri Aug 31 08:28:54 -0700 2007 Fri Aug 31 08:29:36 -0700 2007 http://www.goodreads.com/book_link/follow/8?book_id=14217