Messiah

by Andrei Codrescu

Two extraordinary women, Felicity, a Creole orphan, and Andrea, who found asylum in Jerusalem after time in a Serbian POW camp, meet in New Orleans. Somehow, they understand that they will embody the Messiah as Armageddon races across the globe.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0684803143
• ISBN13: 9780684803142
• Release Date: February 1999
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster
• Length: 366 Pages
• Weight: 1.40 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.4" x 6.6" x 9.6"

Customer Reviews

TOO MUCH FUN FOR ORDINARY BORING PEOPLE TO READ!!

This book was so much fun, I may just read it again! He's hit the millenial nail on head with this one! Finally, someone who doesn't buy into that whole Christian end-times baloney, and instead has fun with it!! Beware "Bible-Thumpers"! This book may upset and scare you!! Reminds me ALOT of Tom Robbins!!

an epochal novel, like Don Quijote

Readers who noticed that "Messiah" is a great millenial tale are only half right. "Messiah" is also a great fin-de-siecle novel, like Don Quijote. Miguel de Cervantes parodied all the chivalric romances of the 16th century and the result was a timeless classic -- and the only chivalric (anti) romance left standing. "Messiah" parodies and subsumes all the millenial graphomania of the 20th century & sweeps clean a whole literature.

A rolicking, enjoyable reading experience

Woven into Andrei Codrescu's MESSIAH, a Byzantine tapestry of incredible lushness, is a wealth of detail that could easily launch a thousand minor novels. Much in the same whimsical tradition of Flann O'Brien's The Dalkey Archives and Raymond Queneau's The Bark Tree, MESSIAH is a work of literature of the continental surrealist stripe. Codrescu's knowledge of arcane religious matters easily rivals that of Umberto Ecco. His insight into the fin de siecle American malaise is as hilarious as it is brilliantly accurate. MESSIAH is a work of language, powerfully poetic. Codrescu's primary calling, that of poet, is amply evident in the exquisite often exotic range of his vocabulary. Like a great jazz musician, his logical improvisations are playful, random, and outlandish. His Bosch-like rendering of New Orleans and Jerusalem, peopled by the pierced, the tattooed, the damned, angels, orphans, apocalyptic madmen, and the great minds of history is darkly comic, presented with a demented zest that pulls the reader headlong and at breakneck speed toward an unpredictable though certainly witty millennial resolution.

The Novel of the Decade

Ambitious, multifaceted, and composed with the kind of imaginative and verbal virtuosity that puts the reader totally at ease, MESSI@H is a rare and wonderful novel. Let certain literary theorists may claim that the great narratives are dead -- Codrescu¹s MESSI@H is brilliant proof tothe contrary. Its two female protagonists are tough, mysterious, and lovable; their adventures are REAL ADVENTURES, in settings (Jerusalem, NewOrleans, cyberspace, Miltonian/Einsteinian angel space) as sensuously realized as the best of Shahrazad¹s 1001 nights or the tales of the Decameron; and the insights the narrative delivers on practically every major blight affecting our present human universe are worthy of Mark Twain (who puts in a cameo appearance). Witty, erudite (but never condescendingly so), and sailing along under the twin flags of Joyful Pessimism and Bluesy Optimism, Codrescu takes us on a truly memorable journey, proving once again the intuitive truth of William Carlos Williams¹ battle cry: ONLY THE IMAGINATION IS REAL! Anselm HolloAuthor of CORVUS, AHOE, AHOE 2: JOHNNY CASH WRITES A LETTER TO SANTA CLAUS, and forthcoming in the Fall of 99, CAWS & CAUSERIES: Around Poetry and Poets (University of New Mexico Press).

The Po' Boy of the apocalypse...

Codrescu's latest, MESSIAH, is brilliant in that cartwheely way that Tom Robbins books usually are- jammed packed with more theological, sociolgical, psychological and above all- eschatological- asides then you'd get in a Phd program. Salvation and lets not forget FOOD all are major players (as is the city of N.O.- really the only place to be if armageddon does come down). Smart, sweet (but not cloyingly so), entertaining as hell and satisfyingly thought provoking. The perfect book to run naked with down Bourbon street this new year's eve- and that's my highest recommendation....