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"So good, so fully realized and meticulously, skillfully rendered. . . . [Rafael] Frumkin can write. . . . A book about crests and troughs, highs and comedowns, joys and brutalities -- about how easily our lives are wrecked, but also how powerfully we're able to survive and rebuild.
— Nathan Hill, The New York Times Book Review
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At its core, The Comedown is about relationships and the joy and pain they bring. In that realm, and others, it’s a resounding success.
— The L.A. Review of Books
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Devastatingly smart...That this is Frumkin's debut makes the ambition of this story all the more remarkable.
— NYLON, 50 Books We Can't Wait to Read in 2018
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"Ambitious, exhilarating...The mystery here is within the hearts of the characters, so compelling that, even when the novel concludes, the reader is left wondering where their lives took them.
— The Columbus Dispatch
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It’s rare that a novel this smart is such an engrossing read...Frumkin is whip-smart and funny. The writing is compulsively readable without being pedestrian. Sentences seem to vibrate. . . A reminder of what good old-fashioned fiction can do.
— The Millions
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Frumkin’s debut may find itself sharing shelf space with Franzen and Chabon. . . . The Comedown is a romp which never loses track of its compassion, messy in a charismatic, lifelike way, a giant, leaping wash of twentieth and twenty-first century Americana which never lapses into cliche. Frumkin’s characters linger long after the final page, such that finishing the book is a comedown of its own.
— Full Stop"Ambitious, sensitive, and busy...this is a powerful debut. Frumkin has talent to burn.
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Frumkin thoughtfully delves into issues of mental illness, addiction, poverty, and racism in a story filled with penetrating insights into the human character. . . . This ambitious saga features vivid and compassionately drawn characters.
— Library Journal (starred)
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With both satirical flair and vestiges of observational reporting. . . . Frumkin has created a snapshot of authentic people in a real place. . . . [Frumkin is a] talented debut novelist with a sharp eye.
— Shelf Awareness
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Frumkin’s powerfully drawn moments present themes of race, religion, and education; addiction and mental illness; sex, love, and inheritance....Frumkin displays a real knack for creating lifelike, original characters and letting them do the talking.
— Booklist
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The Comedown is everything you could want in a novel—an intergenerational family saga, a mystery that spans modern American history, a scalpel cut through our many national foibles and shames. Funny, heartbreaking, tremendous; Frumkin's intelligence and empathy radiates off every page.
— Carmen Maria Machado, author of Her Body and Other Parties
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[Rafael] Frumkin is a writer of deeply impressive imagination and brilliant execution. I’ve read few writers who take such an ambitious and convincing bite of the world.
— Ethan Canin, Guggenheim fellow and author of A Doubter's Almanac, America America and more