The Breaks: A Novel

Richard Price is one of America's greatest authors. He is the millennial link between literature and cinema. And it is a sin that this book, the missing link between his early personal, cinematic works, and his later, directly cinematic social treatises, should be missing. The "Mickey's Monkey" scene alone is a classic.

"The Breaks" is one of the funniest books I have ever read. I've read interviews with Richard Price where he calls this book and his other classic, "Ladies Man", his early "bad" efforts. No way! In "The Breaks" you get several novels for the price of one---all of them great! There's the protagonist's hilarious adventures with depression after college(really!); his earnest but hapless return to his college town; his not-quite-successful romance with a woman a few years older and several decades smarter than him; his sudden urge to be a stand-up comic; and his scary/funny rivalry with his girlfriend's ex-husband. I've owned "The Breaks" for about ten years, and I still reread it periodically when I want a laugh. Mr. Price, you have at least one enthusiastic fan of "The Breaks"!