- Published: 17 May 2022
- ISBN: 9780241985526
- Imprint: Penguin General UK
- Format: Paperback
- Pages: 352
- RRP: $22.99
The Cold Millions
- Published: 17 May 2022
- ISBN: 9780241985526
- Imprint: Penguin General UK
- Format: Paperback
- Pages: 352
- RRP: $22.99
A beautiful, lyric hymn to the power of social unrest in American history. It's funny and harrowing, sweet and violent, innocent and experienced
Anthony Doerr, author of All the Light We Cannot See
The fact that the same author has written books as wildly different and all as transporting as The Zero, The Financial Lives of the Poets, Beautiful Ruins, and now this latest tour de force is testimony to Walter's protean storytelling power and astounding ability to set a scene, any scene . . . We have heard that Jess Walter writes nonstop: Seven days a week, 365 days a year. Please, never stop.
Kirkus Reviews, starred review
Superb.... a splendid postmodern rendition of the social realist novels of the 1930s by Henry Roth, John Steinbeck, and John Dos Passos, updated with strong female characters and executed with pristine prose. This could well be Walter's best work yet.
Publishers Weekly, starred review
A work of irresistible characters, harrowing adventures and rip-roaring fun ... bursting with a dazzling range of outrageous characters. One of the most captivating novels of the year
Washington Post
It's a tremendous work, a vivid, propulsive, historical novel with a politically explosive backdrop that reverberates through our own
USA Today
Jess Walter is a superb storyteller. As polished and hard as a diamond, The Cold Millions reminds us of America's tempestuous past and suggests that all this is anything but past
Boston Globe
Walter marshals a motley, fascinating cast of characters so finely drawn that they lift from the page. I haven't encountered a more satisfying and moving novel about the struggle for workers' rights in America
San Francisco Chronicle
A layered, multi-character panorama
Vogue
It's often said that a novel contains the world; Walter brings new meaning to this phrase, peopling The Cold Millions with vaudeville stars, hobos, suffragists, tycoons, union agitators, policemen, and dozens of other vibrant characters. Warm and deeply humane, this transporting novel is a staggering achievement from a landmark writer
Esquire
Expansive, beguiling . . . A thrilling yarn that simultaneously underscores the cost of progress and celebrates the American spirit
O Magazine
A riotous, propulsive adventure story, packed with captivating characters
Daily Mail
Reminiscent of the stylistic tricks of F Scott Fitzgerald...With its rebellion against inequality and debates about capitalism, there are clear echoes from 1909 to the US today. Incitement to riot, dreadfully topical since the assault on the Capitol last month, also gets a look in. But The Cold Millions offers more: a study of individuals living, willingly or unwillingly, through tumult.
FT
A brilliantly multifaceted panorama of early 20th-century America . . . Walter is a writer whose work deserves a wide readership
Sunday Times
Walter is a class act...the fierce struggle for free speech and workers' rights is genuinely stirring.
Max Davidson, Mail on Sunday
A great tapestry of busy-ness . . . Walter's descriptive passage are marvellous
Francesca Carington, Sunday Telegraph
A timely and poetic read that vividly depicts the American melting pot at its most unequal and volatile . . . a compelling portrait of America at the dawn of the 20th Century
Sunday Express
Colourful and punchy
The Times