From Publishers Weekly
After its 1972 publication, this sprawling, modernist Great American Novel-style epic garnered its author critical comparison to Faulkner, for its saga of rural dynastic decline; Salinger, for its mood of youthful alienation; and Joyce, for its labyrinthine, cryptically allusive, stream-of-consciousness renditions of the private psyche. The episodic coming-of-age narrative follows budding writer Dawes Williams from boyhood on his grandfather's greyhound ranch, through a feckless Iowa adolescence of drinking and joyriding, to a mentally unstable adulthood in which, through rants against propriety, positivism and the establishment and a terminal bout of countercultural dissoluteness in Mexico, he becomes the voice of the 1960s' lost generation. The real action, though, is the development of Dawes's writerly sensibility, his-i.e., the author's-knack for transmuting the dross of reality into the gold of literary metaphor. But Mossman's own lyrical, metaphorical sensibility tends toward pseudo-profundities ("[h]er body was an inward fall, a deep spiral of musky sea lying easily within itself"), abstractions ("[s]he had a metaphysical eye, as blue as perfect nightmares"), and a synesthetic scrambling of sensory categories ("[h]e felt he could not listen to the light anymore, that it stood off in the distance, wordless with impossible opinion"). Long out of print before this reissue, the novel has generated a cult following among those who find in its inchoate but intense imagery the very portrait of the young artist's soul. But many readers may find the book's hallucinatory prose-"In the beginning there was me, green smoke and oatmeal, conscious light, all looking for a shoe to rise from"-interesting but self-indulgent, and the plot insufficiently gripping.Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

FROM OUR EDITORS

Originally published to glowing reviews in 1972, Dow Mossman's first and only novel is a sweeping coming-of-age tale that spans three decades in the life of irrepressible 1950s teen Dawes Williams. Earning its author comparisons to no less than James Joyce, J. D. Salinger, and Mark Twain, this great American novel developed a passionate cult following -- even as it went out of print for more than 20 years -- and recently inspired Mark Moskowitz's award-winning film Stone Reader. View a video clip from the film.

ANNOTATION

Don't miss our exclusive limited-edition DVD of Mark Moskowitz's award-winning film Stone Reader.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

Originally published to glowing reviews in 1972. Dow Mossman's extraordinary debut is a sweeping coming-of-age novel that developed a passionate cult following -- even as it went out of print for more than twenty years. It recently inspired director Mark Moskowitz's award-winning documentary film Stone Reader, which was embraced by readers across the country and described by Peter Rainer in New York magazine as "a marvelous literary thriller that gets at the way books can stay with people forever." Part mystic, part poet, the young, precocious Dawes Williams is learning to curse and shoot firecrackers while trying to understand the larger mysteries of life, his family, and literature. As a teenager, he's stifled by ennui in his hometown of Rapid Cedar. Iowa. Drinking with his buddies, shooting pool, cruising for sex. Dawes tries to be one of the guys, but is set apart by his sensitivity, odd cultural references, and artistic sensibility. Labeled the town eccentric, he becomes increasingly unsettled and, as the turbulence of the 1960s begins to erupt, finds himself fighting for his sanity. Rendered with breathtaking artistry and emotional depth. The Stones of Summer captures the beauty and pain of postwar America, revealing in layer upon layer of richly observed detail the maturation -- the very soul -- of an artist. Remarkable in its ambition and imaginative energy. The Stones of Summer is an epic novel as capacious and particular, as brooding and ebullient, as mystifying and beautiful, as America itself.

FROM THE CRITICS

John Seelye - The New York Times Book Review

"The Stones of Summer" cannot possibly be called a promising first novel for the simple reason that it is such a marvelous achievement that it puts forth much more than mere promise. Fulfillment is perhaps the best word, fulfillment at the first stroke, which is so often the sign of superior talent.... Dow Mossman's novel is a whole river of words fed by a torrential imagination.... For me at least, reading "The Stones of Summer" was crossing another Rubicon, discovering a different sensibility, a brave new world of conciousness. "The Stones of Summer" is a holy book, and it burns with a sacred Byzantine fire, a generational fire, moon-fire, stone-fire.

Publishers Weekly

After its 1972 publication, this sprawling, modernist Great American Novel-style epic garnered its author critical comparison to Faulkner, for its saga of rural dynastic decline; Salinger, for its mood of youthful alienation; and Joyce, for its labyrinthine, cryptically allusive, stream-of-consciousness renditions of the private psyche. The episodic coming-of-age narrative follows budding writer Dawes Williams from boyhood on his grandfather's greyhound ranch, through a feckless Iowa adolescence of drinking and joyriding, to a mentally unstable adulthood in which, through rants against propriety, positivism and the establishment and a terminal bout of countercultural dissoluteness in Mexico, he becomes the voice of the 1960s' lost generation. The real action, though, is the development of Dawes's writerly sensibility, his-i.e., the author's-knack for transmuting the dross of reality into the gold of literary metaphor. But Mossman's own lyrical, metaphorical sensibility tends toward pseudo-profundities ("[h]er body was an inward fall, a deep spiral of musky sea lying easily within itself"), abstractions ("[s]he had a metaphysical eye, as blue as perfect nightmares"), and a synesthetic scrambling of sensory categories ("[h]e felt he could not listen to the light anymore, that it stood off in the distance, wordless with impossible opinion"). Long out of print before this reissue, the novel has generated a cult following among those who find in its inchoate but intense imagery the very portrait of the young artist's soul. But many readers may find the book's hallucinatory prose-"In the beginning there was me, green smoke and oatmeal, conscious light, all looking for a shoe to rise from"-interesting but self-indulgent, and the plot insufficiently gripping. (Oct. 22) Forecast: B&N CEO Steve Riggio secured the chain's right to reissue this epic for a healthy six figures in a deal that also helps finance distribution of the independent film about Mossman, Stone Reader. The Stones of Summer is an achievement, but at 600 dense pages, B&N may end up deciding it's better to stick to the classics. Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

Library Journal

Published to mostly critical acclaim in 1972 -LJ's reviewer hated it-this book, along with its author, disappeared anyway. The story, however, has found new life via the film The Stone Reader, so you might want a copy. Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information.

Linton Weeks - The Washington Post

If you read "The Stones of Summer," you'll discover that it's rare in other ways. As a first novel, it's roller-coaster breathtaking -- in its derring-do and in its defeats. Mossman is obsessed with language and the madcap magic it can conjure. The protagonist, Dawes Williams, is a precocious Iowa kid living in a foulmouthed, foible-filled world. And the landscape Mossman draws is unbelievable -- until you read a hundred pages or so and start to believe it.

Los Angeles Times

The writing is rich, lush, a full harvest of words.... — Russell W. Schoch Jr.Read all 13 "From The Critics" >

WHAT PEOPLE ARE SAYING

I don't believe the phrase "first novel" can adequately describe a book this exuberant, complex, funny, fat, touching, infuriating, lyric and vicious. — C. D.B. Bryan