Rate this book

Clear rating

1 of 5 stars 2 of 5 stars 3 of 5 stars 4 of 5 stars 5 of 5 stars

Bad Monkeys

by Matt Ruff (Goodreads Author)

3.59 of 5 stars 3.59 · rating details · 4,126 ratings · 778 reviews

Jane Charlotte has been arrested for murder.

She tells police that she is a member of a secret organization devoted to fighting evil; her division is called the Department for the Final Disposition of Irredeemable Persons—"Bad Monkeys" for short.

This confession earns Jane a trip to the jail's psychiatric wing, where a doctor attempts to determine whether she is lying, crazy...more

Hardcover, 240 pages

Published July 24th 2007 by Harper (first published 2007)

more details... edit details

Get a copy:

More…

Friend Reviews

To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up.

Lists with This Book

How Not to Murder Your Grumpy by Carol E. Wyer

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson

One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish by Dr. Seuss

Yellowest Books Ever

36th out of 648 books — 298 voters

The Contortionist's Handbook by Craig Clevenger

Best Books You've Never Heard Of

21st out of 284 books — 284 voters

More lists with this book...

Community Reviews

(showing 1-30 of 3,000)

filter | sort: default (?) | rating details

Apr 03, 2013 Richard rated it 3 of 5 stars

Review now at Expendable Mudge Muses Aloud.

With the Amazon takeover causing uncertainty in future treatment of reviews, I'm moving them all to new online homes.

23 likes · like · see review

Sep 14, 2007 Trin rated it 2 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, american-lit

One of those books that starts out great and then totally falls apart. It opens with Jane Charlotte having been arrested for murder in Las Vegas; when she told the police she’s part of a secret government organization (code name: Bad Monkeys) she ended up in the psych ward. The book is comprised of her interviews with the doctor there alternating with her first person account of her story. For about two-thirds of the book, this is fascinating: Ruff—whose Set This House in Order, about Dissociat...more

19 likes · like · see review

Dec 21, 2007 Brian rated it 2 of 5 stars

It's sort of like a runner who starts the race strong, first out of the gate, all eyes are on him. Then he kind of stubs his toe, takes a break, and vigorously walks into the stands looking for an ice cream vendor*.

Sort of.

Trying very hard not to ruin the book, the first half I found extremely compelling. Great premise, well-written, exciting action, good dialog. Read the whole thing in two days. But the more I think about it, the less I like it, because the second half is ever-increasingly fan...more

18 likes · like · see review

May 15, 2008 Xarah rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction, favorite-covers

I really liked the plot of this book - an undercover organization getting rid of evil people and all their high-tec, cool gear to go with it.

The book started off really weird and then got even stranger. It did seem that the last 20-30 pages were a little forced, or maybe, the author wasn't sure how he wanted to end the story. It threw me off until I realized what exactly was going on (which it does get explained).

Despite this strangeness, it was overall a good book. Very different than I've rea...more

3 likes · like · see review

Sep 05, 2007 Patjones rated it 4 of 5 stars

Bad Monkeys was an absolute page turner for me (in every possible positive sense of the phrase). It was like Matt Ruff was channeling Neal Stephenson. Through a primarily first person narrative, with a sprinkling of third person interludes, Bad Monkeys questions the deeper nature of good and evil, and what exactly separates the two, without ever dropping it's fast pace or Matt Ruff's characteristically fun nature.

6 likes · like · see review

Oct 24, 2009 Richard rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Fans of absurdist mind-bending: Men in Black; Philip K. Dick; Fight Club

Recommended to Richard by: Borderlands-Books.com

Shelves: bookclub, scifi, bizarre

This book started as a wild, five-star adventure. The closest comparison is to the movie Men in Black, but in this book the hidden organization is dedicated to rooting out evil, not to protecting aliens blah blah blah. Several parallels to the movie: the organization is completely hidden; they have some crazy technology; due to their unconventional mission they are very tolerant of unconventional personalities and tactics. And, most importantly, Ruff has the same absurdist sense of humor evidenc...more This book started as a wild, five-star adventure. The closest comparison is to the movie Men in Black, but in this book the hidden organization is dedicated to rooting out evil, not to protecting aliens blah blah blah. Several parallels to the movie: the organization is completely hidden; they have some crazy technology; due to their unconventional mission they are very tolerant of unconventional personalities and tactics. And, most importantly, Ruff has the same absurdist sense of humor evidenced by the movie.

The title comes from the nickname for a division within the organization (which, it is made clear, is not part of the government). "Bad Monkeys" are the assassins devoted to killing evil people (real division names tend towards the baroque; this one is: "The Department of Final Disposition of Irredeemable Persons", so you can see why they use nicknames). But not until "Cost-Benefits" has calculated that death is the best option; in some cases redemption might be attempted by the division nicknamed "Good Samaritans" or by "Second and Third Chances". Another division, "Scary Clowns", specializes in Psychological Operations.

Another similarity is to Fight Club. Our protagonist, Jane Charlotte, is very much an unreliable narrator. It soon becomes clear that she might not be telling the truth. It then becomes apparent that she might not know the truth. As we get to the end, it becomes very uncertain whether there is any truth in the book at all.

Ruff chose to pursue this path down the rabbit hole, and unfortunately ended up with a weaker book thereby. He gets to demonstrate his extreme cleverness, but at the expense of his readers' engagement. His choice led to a convoluted, mind-bending conclusion that is reminiscent of some of Philip K. Dick, but because he maintains a consistent and well-balanced plot, Ruff actually writes a much better story than PDK. Folks that like the movies made from Dick's stories are quite likely to enjoy this book.

The best news: even though this isn't the blow-out promised by the first pages, the book is a short and fast read. Probably four or five hours.
(less)

4 likes · like · see review

Nov 24, 2008 Powells.com rated it 5 of 5 stars

Monkey Shines
A review by Gerry Donaghy

Jane Charlotte works for The Department of Final Disposition of Irredeemable Persons, a division of a nameless organization dedicated to fighting evil. The nickname for her division is Bad Monkeys, and at the beginning of Matt Ruff's novel of the same name, Jane is being questioned by a police psychiatrist regarding her involvement in a recent murder. When asked if she punishes evil people, Jane responds glibly, "No. Usually we just kill them." But the victi...more Monkey Shines
A review by Gerry Donaghy

Jane Charlotte works for The Department of Final Disposition of Irredeemable Persons, a division of a nameless organization dedicated to fighting evil. The nickname for her division is Bad Monkeys, and at the beginning of Matt Ruff's novel of the same name, Jane is being questioned by a police psychiatrist regarding her involvement in a recent murder. When asked if she punishes evil people, Jane responds glibly, "No. Usually we just kill them." But the victim in question wasn't evil and ensuing interrogation traces Jane's recruitment into the organization and the body count she's accumulated along the way.

Matt Ruff is the kind of author who has yet to write the same book twice. While I was not a fan of his debut novel Fool on the Hill, I was quite impressed with both of his subsequent novels: the Edward Abbey-meets-Ayn Rand-via-Thomas Pynchon flavored Sewer, Gas and Electric, and the achingly stirring tale of multiple personality disorder Set This House in Order. Both are books that I've recommended without hesitation in the past and I'm happy to report that Bad Monkeys can be similarly endorsed.

Bad Monkeys inhabits the same literary space as the drug-fueled paranoia of Philip K. Dick, owing a particular debt to Minority Report. In that story, the protagonist is a detective in a division of the police department that investigates what are called "pre-cog" crimes, arresting perpetrators before they have a chance to act on their impulses. In Ruff's universe, it's not a matter of seeing the future as much as handicapping it, singling out bad seeds and eradicating them. It's not about justice; it's about, as one the Bad Monkeys operatives puts it, "fighting evil in all its forms." Bad Monkeys is an intriguing exploration of moral relativism set in a plot so labyrinthine that it could have sprung from the mind of Borges if he wrote screenplays for Michael Bay. Often the lines between heroes and villains are blurred, and the organization, which is ostensibly fighting for good, engages in surveillance so ubiquitous and undetectable that Alberto Gonzales would be green with envy. And, there is never any explanation as to who charges the Bad Monkeys with their tasks or gave them a license to kill. It's a shadow organization whose umbra gets murkier the longer Jane works for them.

But ultimately, as Jane is being interrogated, her reliability as a narrator is called into question as the psychiatrist presents evidence that refutes her testimony. Ruff throws the reader some astounding curveballs, often necessitating the need to re-read and re-re-read some passages to make tentative sense of what's going on. In this way, Bad Monkeys pleasingly resembles cinematic brain corkscrews such as Memento and The Usual Suspects.

There was a review published recently in Bookforum about Bad Monkeys that not only gave away all of the plot surprises, but was fairly mean-spirited as well, stating, "I give away the surprise ending because I doubt anyone who reads this review will read Bad Monkeys." He then chides the author for not being Nabokov. Maybe I'm just another Kool-Aid drinker, or maybe this Bookforum critic is an irredeemable curmudgeon, but I don't think that's what Ruff was striving for. Rather, he's trying his hand at the pulp genre, writing a book that is practically begging to be turned into a film. Maybe that's a bad thing to some folks. But with a beguiling storyline and taut pacing, Bad Monkeys may not be Nabokov, but it is one hundred percent Matt Ruff. That alone makes it worth recommending. (less)

5 likes · like · see review

Dec 04, 2008 Erica rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: everyone

I've attempted to not give away any pertinant inforation about the story, however if you don't want to know anything at all...don't read this review.

I wasn’t quite sure what to expect from this book when I began reading it and I found my self scrutinizing the book in the beginning. I couldn’t decide if I liked, loved or would place it on the ‘don’t know what to think’ shelf. It was different; written almost entirely from a dialogue point of view, seen almost entirely from one characters point of...more I've attempted to not give away any pertinant inforation about the story, however if you don't want to know anything at all...don't read this review.

I wasn’t quite sure what to expect from this book when I began reading it and I found my self scrutinizing the book in the beginning. I couldn’t decide if I liked, loved or would place it on the ‘don’t know what to think’ shelf. It was different; written almost entirely from a dialogue point of view, seen almost entirely from one characters point of view and you’re questioning the whole time, ‘Is she crazy, is this real, what will happen at the end’? It didn’t take long before I thought this is starting to get really interesting and strange and I think I like it.

Early on, I only considered two options; she’s crazy and they’ll prove it… She’s not crazy and her “organization” will get her out of this. Usually I can figure out the ending to a book before I read it as most endings are predictable, this one threw me for a complete loop.

It twisted and turned, which augmented my interest in the book and added to the oddity of the story. The entire book was a complete plan that you were not privy to until the last chapter. You were fooled the whole way through. Early on in the book, when she was talking about doing something with her life and yet all she had done was do drugs and jump from job to job I thought it was strange that the good people would want her (and no wonder why they wanted her…)

Later in the book when I almost believed she was good, just lost along the way, I thought I can’t believe they are going to turn her bad when she was trapped by the bad Monkey’s. This is what I loved about the book. I like being kept in suspense until the very end. I like not knowing what’s going to happen until it happens. This book was far from predictable in its outlandishness! And even though it was right there in front of my face, I didn’t really acknowledge the idea of where she was. With all the killing going on around her I truly believed she had been caught and was in a mental institution. Finding out about the doctor was, was the best part!!

The premise behind the book was a great. Jane was a great actress in the story. Attempting to make us believe she’s been hallucinating and creating a vision of people that weren’t really there. At about the halfway mark, I thought her brother is dead and she is imaging him coming to her because she is guilty that she allowed him to be killed. And I think the Evil Jane Twin was really her, she stepped outside of the box and described it as if she was looking through the window. It was her way of describing to us how bad she really was, and thinking the whole time she was fooling us into believing the Bad Monkey’s actually created a twin Jane to attempt to bring her down (which she had me going at one point). The whole story made me really think that she was sick in the head and the end of it proved that even though it all existed (she hadn’t made all of it all up), she was definitely sick in the head!!

Overall, I enjoyed this story and I really liked the book. I’ve given it 4 stars and I would recommend it as a silly, quirky, strange read to any one who likes that kind of book. It was imaginative and interesting…and it was fun to read!!
(less)

4 likes · like · see review

Sep 17, 2008 Thomas rated it 1 of 5 stars

Jane Charlotte is being held in a psychiatric unit and is being questioned about a murder she committed. She tells the doctor the story of her life - kicked out of her house by her mother as a teenager, growing into a life of drugs and poor decisions. In her teens, she has a chance encounter with a serial killer at her school and is saved thanks to the intervention of a secret organization dedicating to fighting evil. From that point on, Jane knows she will one day work for that group.

Although i...more

2 likes · like · see review

Aug 19, 2007 Mikol rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: everyone

This was my first read of a Matt Ruff book. I would read one of his earlier books.

This was an easy entertaining read. The whole thing took 2-3 days.

I picked the title up at Santoro's, a bookseller on Greenwood in the Phinney Ridge neighborhood. I was killing time, wanting to sample a snack at "Olivers Twist" down the block that opened at 5pm. I knew that Santoro's was the meeting place for the Seattle Storytellers Guild, an organization I once patronized. I nearly did not go in. The window displ...more

1 like · like · see review

Jul 26, 2007 Megan rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: quirky-fiction

Jane Charlotte is an operative for the underground agency known as bad monkeys. They take care of the evil criminal element in society that the regular law enforcement community can't or won't deal with. Or is she? When we meet her she is in a psych ward, so everything in her highly entertaining story is suspect. And it *is* entertaining, as she describes being recruited into the shadowy group, given her first NC gun (Natural Causes - it allows them to take out the criminal element and make it l...more

1 like · like · see review

May 16, 2009 Georg rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: english, crime

As many of the Good Readers pointed out, this novel begins very strong and it ends very weak. This sounds not too bad but it is: What makes me angry (and I would like Ruff to give me my money/time back) is that it begins strong because it ends weak. Let me explain: It is not very difficult to make a really good beginning. You only have to make the reader think "How will this end?". And the reader will be rewarded if all the loose ends will be cleared in the end. But if they don't the reader will...more

9 likes · like · see review

Jan 29, 2009 Landon rated it 3 of 5 stars

I read this book in a single day. It's fluid, the dialogue is good, plot swift and deliberate: all in all a page turner in the best sense. This was a very fun, thorouhly entertaining read with, at its core, a real tangle of moral conundrum.

The novel definitly becomes steadily more and more fantastical but to my mind, this progression is very tightly controlled. The deliberate escelation is pinned carefully to the underlying themes and questions the book is exploring and the heroine is a facinat...more

1 like · like · see review

Sep 06, 2007 Geoff rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: People who like Christopher Moore, Tom Robbins, and Matt Ruff

Matt Ruff is one of my favorites. Fool on the Hill was Sci-Fi/fantasy with a college twist. Gas, Sewer, Electric for me fell a little short, seemed a little contrived, but was a good read. Set this House in Order was brilliant, adult, and a tad sad.

Bad Monkeys has elements of all three. It is a little more wry and witty ala Christopher Moore and Tom Robbins, but it also deals with some serious issues (mental health & child abuse). It's a fascinating read on many levels.

I thought the ending w...more

3 likes · like · see review

Feb 18, 2012 Chumbert Squurls rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: surreal, thriller, science-fiction

If you've run out of Philip K. Dick books or movies based on his books, this book has some of that zaniness and snappy dialogue, while also being a heck of a lot more action packed. It's a little less discombobulating than the drug induced drawl PKD conjured, but don't think of this only as pure PKD pastiche. Ruff's view of the world is less cynical and there is a less desperate paranoia that parodies old spy films, which comes across as fresh and exciting. If you can ignore the annoying, self i...more

1 like · like · see review

Jul 04, 2008 Laura rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: mystery-thriller, alternate-worlds

The backcover of my paperback makes a lot of the The Matrix meets The Silence of the Lambs concept - which almost made me not buy the book - but it really was a page-turner. I tend to like the is-she-insane or is-it-really-happening genre; and the book reads like watching a mostly well-produced thriller. There is one plot twist too many at the very end (I wish clever author boys could find a way to contain their cleverness for the greater good of all humankind) but I enjoyed most of the story.

2 likes · like · see review

Mar 24, 2009 Karen Field rated it 4 of 5 stars

Wow! I finished this book in two days. That should say everything! But I guess I should say more than that, so I will.

Bad Monkeys by Matt Ruff is not a book I would have picked up in the library and brought home for myself. Someone else would have to pick it for me. In fact, that is exactly what happened. I arrived home from work one afternoon to find the book sitting on my bed.

“I saw that and thought you’d like it,” said Gary.

I looked at the cover. It wasn’t pretty, or intriguing, or special i...more Wow! I finished this book in two days. That should say everything! But I guess I should say more than that, so I will.

Bad Monkeys by Matt Ruff is not a book I would have picked up in the library and brought home for myself. Someone else would have to pick it for me. In fact, that is exactly what happened. I arrived home from work one afternoon to find the book sitting on my bed.

“I saw that and thought you’d like it,” said Gary.

I looked at the cover. It wasn’t pretty, or intriguing, or special in any way. It was plain and quite boring looking. “Oh, thanks.”

I didn’t intend to give the book another thought, except to put it in the “Return to the Library Pile” at the end of the week. However, Gary is always thinking of me and I never show gratitude by even reading the book cover. This time I thought I’d at least do that.

Hmm, not bad, I thought. OK, I’ve got five minutes. I’ll read the first chapter or, at the very least, the first page. Then I can tell him I attempted to read it but got bored.

Two hours later my eyes left the pages of the book and I was surprised to find that I had read over 100 pages. I went to do some things around the house. Whilst my hands did the washing and the vacuuming, my mind was still thinking about the story. I couldn’t get it out of my head. Why? The author planted a seed that needed watering. He answered questions but kept filling my mind with more issues that I needed answers too. I was obsessed and needed to return to the book.

So I did. Several times over the two days it took me to read the book. I lost sleep over it too. I’m not particularly happy about that, but doesn’t it tell you how hooked I was? It does me.

So what is the book about? I can’t tell you! You’ll have to get a copy and read it for yourself. You are, however, guaranteed twists and turns that make you giddy. You will love the characters, they are so real. The words will play with your mind so that you won’t know what is true and what is real for that matter. And the author has a nice sense of humour too, which makes for an even more enjoyable read.

The library classified this as a detective story. OK, it is in a small way, but slotting this story into one genre is hard unless there’s a genre that covers science fiction, mystery, humour, fantasy and a touch of … weird.

Do yourself a favour. Read the book.

(less)

1 like · like · see review

Feb 04, 2009 Bob Redmond rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

In this story, the protagonist--a thirty-something Femme Nikita--faces an interrogation that exposes her sordid, adventurous, secret-agent past, and eventually illuminates her moral state as good or evil (I won't divulge which). Told in episodic backstory, the novel covers the twin tropes of brotherhood: from the macro (Big Brother is Watching) to the micro ("am I my brother's keeper?"). It also has plenty of serial killing, drugs, geeky technology and plastic explosives.

The book is an ungainly...more In this story, the protagonist--a thirty-something Femme Nikita--faces an interrogation that exposes her sordid, adventurous, secret-agent past, and eventually illuminates her moral state as good or evil (I won't divulge which). Told in episodic backstory, the novel covers the twin tropes of brotherhood: from the macro (Big Brother is Watching) to the micro ("am I my brother's keeper?"). It also has plenty of serial killing, drugs, geeky technology and plastic explosives.

The book is an ungainly stew of Kurt Vonnegut, Chuck Palahniuk, Daniel Defoe, and Franz Kafka. The police state--as well as the emotional states--it describes get more extreme with each chapter, and Ruff reaches for some kind of Statement About Humanity towards the end, which falls flat because he's basically exhausted his story partway through.

In the first two thirds, Ruff--to his credit--suggests but never divulges the key signature of the piece. Rather than performing an autopsy of his concerns, he animates them with extremely well-written scenes including those of the protagonist's runaway days and later, of her misadventures as a liquor store clerk. He introduces minor characters who have dimension and spends time on physical and theoretical landscape, with room on the narrative stage for all of it, in turns, to crackle, snap, and breathe. Are we in northern California, or in some wasteland watching Cain and Abel march off together? Is the obvious middle-aged man in a white van really a serial killer? Is the girl in the white room making shit up about Keyser Soze, or is she a sympathetic refugee from a war between secret agencies?

In fact, the book is quite a page-turner, at least until about 160 pages in. But then, Ruff trades in most of the minor characters for new ones with progressively more cartoonish identities (with names like "Love" and "Wise," for instance). And forget one Deus Ex Machina to wrap things up: in this book there are a whole crew of Deities (actually, clowns), while tons of explosives and some magic drugs completely obliterate the space-time continuum and any remaining narrative gravity along with it.

So finally the book becomes an idea of a book. Or an incomplete novel worthy of Vonnegut is followed by an essay on human nature in the form of a Henry Miller daydream filtered through a Michael Mann film? It's an interesting dish, but like one culinary experiment in which I glazed some meat with maple syrup, it ends up not tasting as good as one would hope.

Three stars for belting a double off the wall but getting thrown out at third to end the game.

(less)

3 likes · like · see review

May 16, 2013 Tonya rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Shelves: fantasy-sci-fi

Bad Monkeys is a book that shows wonderful promise in the beginning and seems to fall flat in the end. This did not make me hate it but it did take a nose dive from 5 star to 3. I had read it years ago and came across it when moving books around the other day. I did not recall if I enjoyed it so I started a reread.

We first meet Jane Charlotte in an interrogation room or psych ward room, it had only a couple chairs and a table with two people talking one was Jane and the other only referred to as...more

1 like · like · see review

Mar 29, 2013 Jacob rated it 3 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This is was my first adult novel outside of the vast reaches of Stephen King's authorship (into which I had delved around 4 books into before testing the waters of non-SA fiction more than I already had with this book). This book, when I first read it, blew me away. The depravity of some portions, the mystery, the unique structure of psych exams splitting flashback chapters apart. If I were to have rated it upon reading it the first time, this would get 6 million stars and the site would crash....more

like · see review

Aug 26, 2012 Benjamin added it

Shelves: bedside-reading

All the Goodreads reviews for this book say the same thing: excellent premise/opening, fast-paced, short, disappointing ending. I don't think I can add much to that summary: Ruff's book starts off with a woman explaining why she killed a man--it has to do with this secret organization that she's a part of, an organization that kills bad people (colloquially: bad monkeys), and that has such wide-reaching powers that they can spy on people through the eyes on money and kill people in ways that loo...more

like · see review

May 13, 2012 John rated it 3 of 5 stars

I am not a bad monkey. Inevitably, I want to think the best of everyone. That gives me an interesting perspective when reading this book, and ultimately I'm not sure it was a good one.

The book opens with Jane Charlotte being held in a psychiatric ward in Las Vegas, telling her story to a psychiatrist charged with evaluating her. I enjoyed the method that Ruff used in telling the story as a flashback explained to a skeptic who doesn't believe Jane's story. Is Jane telling the truth - does she rea...more

like · see review

Apr 25, 2012 Vanessa Fox rated it 3 of 5 stars

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. Here's the thing. It's one thing for a book to be clever. It's another thing to be clever simply for the sake of trying to prove to your readers that you're more clever than they are.

If a reader invests time and emotion into a book, the writer should give that reader something back at the end. It doesn't have to be a happy ending; it can be a sad one. Or an unexpected twist. Something.

This book gives you gloating about how clever the writer is. It could have worked out if only I, as the reader,...more

like · see review

Apr 03, 2012 Shoshana rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: adult, im-having-trouble-categorizing-it

THIS BOOK WAS SO CONFUSING.

I love Matt Ruff. I was so glad when the newest book - what's it called? something about Iraq and the U.S. being inverted in a parallel universe present day - came out, because it meant I could read the last one (this one)! He writes so slowly, and I try to make myself wait as long as possible to read him, because I don't ever want to NOT have a Matt Ruff book waiting for me. LOVE HIM.

I actually really don't want to say much about Bad Monkeys, because I feel like almos...more

like · see review

Feb 19, 2012 Nonky rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. This was an unexpected pleasure. I bought the ebook because it was inexpensive I liked the synopsis. I usually enjoy anti-heroes and secret society plots, and that was a big part of the entertainment, but the depth grows as the story progresses.

Jane is a reckless kid who grows up with distant family members, after an unspecified event makes it impossible for her single mother to keep her. In a very small town with no friends or even acquaintances, she does her best to find trouble. She unwittin...more This was an unexpected pleasure. I bought the ebook because it was inexpensive I liked the synopsis. I usually enjoy anti-heroes and secret society plots, and that was a big part of the entertainment, but the depth grows as the story progresses.

Jane is a reckless kid who grows up with distant family members, after an unspecified event makes it impossible for her single mother to keep her. In a very small town with no friends or even acquaintances, she does her best to find trouble. She unwittingly finds out the high school janitor is a serial killer and pedophile. Her experience with the police has made her reluctant to call them without proof, and she ends up in the back of the janitor's van while he looks for victims. After a close call, she is rescued from his house, and tells the police what she's seen. Unfortunately, the evidence is hidden by then, and she is considered unreliable.

The janitor waits for the proverbial dark and stormy night to go to her house and kill her, but Jane has been scouted by a secret organization that fights evil in absurdly maintained secrecy. A toy gun appears just in time for her to shoot the janitor, and she passes out. When she awakes safe in her own bed, there is no sign of the adventure, but a strange coin to prove it did happen.

There are sporadic mentions of her brother Phil, the good child and their mother's favourite. He is the subject of a rather large plot twist, but also the only friendly face for Jane throughout a troubled life. She uses drugs and sex recreationally, not without some guilt and consequences. Her jobs are all fly-by-night for low pay. She is still prone to trouble and antisocial to just about everybody.

More than half her lifetime passes before she is called upon again, mysteriously summoned to audition for Bad Monkeys. Her handler is tolerant of her impulse control issues, and tries to give her many chances to channel her aggression and problems with authority. Through many tests, Jane learns the seriousness of her new calling. Ultimately, she is judged for her actions.

The main plot is the action plot, which was exciting and surprising. Without spoiling the many really interesting ideas, it has a paranoid hyperactivity that simulates Jane's own feelings. There is a feeling of perhaps exploiting misery by enjoying the take downs of the bad monkeys, a sense of guilt that is particularly relevant as the mysteries are decoded.

The labyrinthine organization Jane works for, and the opposing side with equal complexity are a well realized series of reveals. Everything fits together, to make a kind of experimental organic logic. Even Jane's gung-ho antics are based on a real human feeling of wanting to do something important. Where the book really doubled in value for me was the spin by the last chapter, when we find out good and evil are everywhere and all the time. The philosophy isn't heavy or overwhelming, but by the end you can look back over the whole book and see thread of it coalescing until the climax.

I have a soft spot for twisty books that wrap up all the angles well, and this one is an excellent example. For all the chaos of events, all the pieces fit together to give a portrait of Jane as a crime-fighting loose cannon, and a threat just as evil as some of the people she's trying to stop.(less)

like · see review

Dec 17, 2011 Sarah Tobias added it

Sometimes I pick up a book because the cover or the title intrigues me. Sometimes I choose the book because the advance praise quote is from an author that I really like. I often reject books because of what I read on the inside flap. I just have to ignore those pesky summarizations.
I picked up Bad Monkeys by Matt Ruff because of the cover (bright yellow with a Rorschach inkblot, the title, and the advance praise (Christopher Moore, one of my top 10 favorite authors).

Maybe it’s all the rain in S...more

like · see review

Dec 10, 2011 Julia rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: highly-recommended

You know, in all honesty, I'm amazed that I liked Bad Monkeys as much as I did. There was a really out-there plot and the whole thing was told in an interrogation style third person. I can understand why others haven't enjoyed it.

That said, I could not put it down. I started it this afternoon, and finished it this evening (well, 2:30 am, but that's not the point). Jane Charlotte is arrested for murder in Las Vegas, and, as the book opens, is preparing to be seen by the head doctor in the prison...more

like · see review

Aug 17, 2011 Marcus rated it 4 of 5 stars

I liked it...but I don't know why.

The story reads like (maybe intentionally) someone is reading their diary to you. There's very little descriptive details in the narrative. The main character, Jane Charlotte, doesn't relay many physical details about the people she interacts with and doesn't convey much in the way of place (atmosphere, buildings, scenary, et al). There's a preponderous amount of "I did this...", "I went here...", "I talked to...". Throughout the book I felt like I was listening...more

like · see review

Aug 02, 2011 Michael Foley rated it 5 of 5 stars

Bad Monkeys, quite simply, will blow your mind.
I've never been a big fan of science fiction, and in fact, was skeptical of this book because of that label, but had to try it after reading the spectacular reviews (in particular one by crime fiction master Marcus Sakey).
I'm glad I did. The sci-fi element is very nearly nonexistent. There are no aliens, there is no dystopian society. Bad Monkeys is a very realistic portrait of the world we live in. The book is funny, suspenseful, and tragic simulta...more

like · see review

Mar 28, 2011 Bookspread rated it 5 of 5 stars

Jane Charlotte has been arrested for murdering someone that she shouldn't have, and is trying to convince Doctor Vale, a police psychiatrist, that she is not a criminal. The setting is

“It’s a room an uninspired playwright might conjure while staring at a blank page: White walls. White ceiling. White floor. Not featureless, but close enough to raise suspicions that its few contents are crucial to the upcoming drama.”

Jane Charlotte says that she belongs to an extremely evolved organization committ...more

like · see review

« previous 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 … 99 100 next »

new topic
Discuss This Book

topics	posts	views	last activity
Would you kill Bad Monkeys?	6	72	Jan 18, 2012 01:29pm
rp	2	18	May 08, 2011 01:55pm

combine
Other Editions (18)

More editions...

Genres

Science Fiction

62 users

Fantasy

34 users

Mystery

28 users

Thriller

25 users

Mystery > Crime

18 users

Humor

11 users

Adult Fiction

9 users

Science Fiction Fantasy

8 users

Thriller > Mystery Thriller

8 users

Speculative Fiction

8 users

See top shelves...

Readers also enjoyed similar books

About Matt Ruff

I was born in New York City in 1965. I decided I wanted to be a fiction writer when I was five years old and spent my childhood and adolescence learning how to tell stories. At Cornell University I wrote what would become my first published novel, Fool on the Hill, as my senior thesis in Honors English. My professor Alison Lurie helped me find an agent, and within six months of my college graduati...more

More about Matt Ruff...

Books by Matt Ruff

Set This House in Order: A Romance of Souls

Sewer, Gas and Electric: The Public Works Trilogy

The James Tiptree Award Anthology 1: Sex, the Future, & Chocolate Chip Cookies

More…

Share This Book

Facebook Twitter Your website

Trivia About Bad Monkeys

2 trivia questions

More quizzes & trivia...

Quotes from Bad Monkeys

“Loosely translated Der schlechte Affe hasst seinen eigenen Geruch means that people are most deeply offended by moral failings that mirror their own.” — 6 people liked it

“Hi," I said. "I'm the last of the Brontë sisters.” — 3 people liked it

More quotes…

title link	preview: Bad Monkeys
avg rating	preview: Bad Monkeys Goodreads rating: 3.59 (4126 ratings)
small image	preview: click here [close]
med image	preview: click here [close]
BBCode	[url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/71845.Bad_Monkeys?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book][img]http://d.gr-assets.com/books/1300479869l/71845.jpg[/img][/url] [url=http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/71845.Bad_Monkeys?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_book]Bad Monkeys by Matt Ruff[/url]

Bad Monkeys

Friend Reviews

Community Reviews

Share This Book

Share This Book on Your Website