Suder

By: Percival Everett

Narrated by: JD Jackson

‘American literature’s philosopher king – and its sharpest satirist’ – The New Yorker

Craig Suder, third baseman for the Seattle Mariners, is in a slump. His batting average is shocking, his marriage somehow worse, and he secretly fears he’s inherited his mother’s insanity. Ordered to take a midseason rest, Suder instead takes his LP of Charlie Parker’s “Ornithology” and flees.

A dazzling tale of madness, confinement and the need for escape, Suder introduced Percival Everett to the world as a writer already fully capable of conjuring whole lives and worlds on the page.

Part of the Picador Collection, a series celebrating fifty years of Picador books and showcasing the best of modern literature.

Read Percival's Pulitzer Prize-winning novel James in paperback now.

Critic reviews

A mad work of comic genius, combining symbols and myths from ancients and moderns, white culture and black, juxtaposing heartbreaks with farce to make up a narrative that has never, never been told before

[A] marvellous first novel

Very funny – sometimes excruciatingly so

Who could meld baseball and jazz with the most wistful male myth of all – the Icarus myth –remembering that Daedalus really did do it: He flew

American literature’s philosopher king – and its sharpest satirist

Everett has mastered the movement between unspeakable terror and knock out comedy

Perplex

The degeneration of this novel was quite intriguing. The story is unusual and encourages deep thought about dealing with mental illness and other related issues, which can be somewhat confusing. You might need to listen to it twice to fully understand what's happening. At first, it may feel disorienting if you try to follow the plot closely. Although it's complex, the exploration of mental illness makes it an enjoyable experience overall.