MARCH 2019 - AudioFile
Though the details are sparse, narrator Dion Graham provides a vivid sense of the world in this audiobook and its characters.Two men, known only pseudonymously as Four and Nine, are tasked by an unnamed corporation with paving a road in an unnamed war-torn country. Graham delivers outstanding voicework that captures the two characters’ personalities. As Four, a seasoned company man laser-focused on finishing the job, Graham’s speech is clipped and businesslike. Nine is the total opposite—carefree, reckless, always hobnobbing with locals—and Graham’s nonchalant voice for him is nearly unrecognizable from Four’s. The contrast between them, especially Four’s increasing exasperation with Nine, borders on black comedy. But Graham keeps a balanced tone that maintains the story’s tension and doesn’t undercut its themes. A.T.N. © AudioFile 2019, Portland, Maine
Publishers Weekly
01/14/2019
Eggers’s unremarkable latest (after The Monk of Mokha) follows two unnamed men sent to an unnamed country by an unnamed corporation to pave a road. The country—tropical, malarial—is emerging from years of civil war, and a new road running through the heart of the country is intended to be a first step by the government to unite the populace. The men charged with paving it are code-named Four and Nine. Four is a stoic company man intent on getting the job done ahead of schedule and with as little fuss as possible. Nine exists seemingly only to annoy Four; he talks incessantly, has no problem breaking company protocol—particularly when it comes to interacting with locals, which the company prohibits but he engages in endlessly—and does pretty much anything other than his job, including playing in a potentially contaminated river. As Four gets to work, Nine becomes increasingly irresponsible, and after his antics predictably get him ill and in trouble with the locals, both men end up in a precarious, possibly grave, situation. The repetitive narrative, sparse prose, and overall vagueness lend this an allegorical feel, and because the reader spends the whole book waiting for the hammer to drop, when it finally does (on the last page), it lands with more a thud than a wallop. There’s nothing particularly bad about this, but it comes across as more an exercise than a full-blooded novel. (Mar.)
From the Publisher
"The Parade is a heartbreaker and a mindbender. It is a novel of ideas that packs an emotional punch that left me reeling. With clear, unadorned prose, Eggers lays bare the costs of war, and of peace." –Tayari Jones, author of An American Marriage
"This is a tale for our time, an allegory about intervening in foreign lands without knowledge, and so a nightmare vision of our endless wars." —Thomas E. Ricks, author of Fiasco and Churchill and Orwell
"A parable of progress, as told by J.M. Coetzee to Philip K. Dick." —Richard Flanagan, author of Gould’s Book of Fish and The Narrow Road to the Deep North
"In The Parade, the anxiety grows with every page and every mile to reach an ending that turns everything upside down and sends us into the heart of darkness. A minimalistic, merciless novel. A powerful allegory and a painfully concrete contemporary story—Eggers is a true virtuoso of that synthesis." —Georgi Gospodinov, author of The Physics of Sorrow
"The ever-incisive, worldly-wise, compassionate, and imaginative Eggers maintains the tension of a cocked crossbow in this magnetizing, stealthily wry, and increasingly chilling tale." –Booklist
"Eggers… may be the only living American writer for whom the term ‘Hemingway-esque’ meaningfully applies…. Eggers ably weaves in a host of ethical questions over one man's responsibility to the other, what makes help transactional versus simply kind…. An unassuming but deceptively complex morality play, as Eggers distills his ongoing concerns into ever tighter prose." —Kirkus
"A testament to Eggers’ expert skill at point of view... The Parade is a deeply felt book that defies easy labels. This is a book you can finish in a single sitting. And you will." —Tony Romano, The Parade
MARCH 2019 - AudioFile
Though the details are sparse, narrator Dion Graham provides a vivid sense of the world in this audiobook and its characters.Two men, known only pseudonymously as Four and Nine, are tasked by an unnamed corporation with paving a road in an unnamed war-torn country. Graham delivers outstanding voicework that captures the two characters’ personalities. As Four, a seasoned company man laser-focused on finishing the job, Graham’s speech is clipped and businesslike. Nine is the total opposite—carefree, reckless, always hobnobbing with locals—and Graham’s nonchalant voice for him is nearly unrecognizable from Four’s. The contrast between them, especially Four’s increasing exasperation with Nine, borders on black comedy. But Graham keeps a balanced tone that maintains the story’s tension and doesn’t undercut its themes. A.T.N. © AudioFile 2019, Portland, Maine
Kirkus Reviews
2019-01-21
A plan to lay down a roadway runs into a few barriers in this parable of friendship and politics.
The pared-down style and global themes that Eggers has embraced since A Hologram for the King (2012)—he may be the only living American writer for whom the term "Hemingway-esque" meaningfully applies—have restricted him to writing two kinds of novels. Eggers the Compassionate Realist focuses on men and women forced to adapt to economic shifting sands (Hologram; Heroes of the Frontier, 2016); Eggers the Dour Lecturer focuses on social justice concerns in ways that smother his characters (The Circle, 2013). This short novel showcases the virtues of the former, though there's a whiff of pedagogy in the prose. Two men, Four and Nine, have been assigned to pave a road in an unnamed country recovering from civil war. Four is an experienced, by-the-book type, concerned only with meeting his deadline before a celebratory parade. Nine is a reckless newbie, neglecting cautions against eating local food, swimming in a local river, and carousing. Eggers doesn't play this for comedy, Odd Couple-style, not even a little; we're mostly in Four's increasingly infuriated mind, and we know that the country is unstable enough that Nine's antics court serious consequences. But when it does, Eggers ably weaves in a host of ethical questions over one man's responsibility to the other, what makes help transactional versus simply kind, and whether the road itself will truly "bring safety and progress to the provinces at seventy miles an hour." The closing paragraphs of this short novel take an abrupt turn into Dour Lecturer territory, but the shift is earned; Eggers is determined to counter the notion that social and economic improvement work hand in hand, and Four and Nine ultimately resonate as characters as much as archetypes.
An unassuming but deceptively complex morality play, as Eggers distills his ongoing concerns into ever tighter prose.
