Mailman (Revised) - Softcover

"Mailman is madness, pure dazzling energy. Lennon's writing contains enough electricity to light up the country." -- Ann Patchett "This deliciously antic and deeply serious book confirms J. Robert Lennon's reputation as one of the best young American novelists at work today. Both wildly eccentric and blandly familiar, Mailman (born Albert Lippincott), disgruntled civil servant and spectacular underachiever, is a brilliant creation. Where his quirky imagination, incorrigible criminal tendencies, misguided idealism, lustful fantasies, and passionate search for love, meaning, and redemption will take him keeps the reader fascinated until the astonishing end. At heart, the unforgettable Mailman is a romantic, and Mailman is a great American romance." -- Sigrid Nunez "Because I love books that are marked by strong narrative and a wealth of intimate detail, I found myself completely enthralled by this novel. In its straightforward but cunning portrayal of the Mailman and his voyeuristic universe, this book not only conveys the quite interesting inner life of its main character, but also poses a number of questions about identity, love and cultural transplantation. With an all-American veneer and a sense of humor that gives portions of this novel a nearly 1940-esque Hollywood coziness, it has its own heart of darkness, and, as such, is sure to please not only the reader who cherishes lively and rewarding fiction, but those who read for their inner enrichment as well." -- Oscar Hijuelos "Alfred Lippincott ... is destined to become one of the great characters in American literature." -- David Henderson "As emotionally devastating as it is scabrously funny." -- Carina Chocano "J. Robert Lennon's Mailman is hilarious, touching, and so outrageous in its appeals I'd love to think it didn't cut so deep. But it does, becomes part of one's nervous system. A dazzling novel, certainly, but also one which has a cumulative power so strong it works its finest work against our will. Lennon is in control of a nervous prose and a remarkable ability to tap the funniest and most telling details, and inside his rare artistic generosity is a darkly comic vision whose scope we have not seen in decades. The absurd mailman of the title, Albert Lippincott, is one of the great inescapable characters of our time." -- James Kincaid, Department of English, USC

"A phantasmagoria of American paranoia and self-loathing in the person of a deranged but somehow good-hearted middle-aged mail carrier in steep decline, the book hums with a kind of chipper angst," writes Jonathan Lethem in the Los Angeles Times Book Review. Mailman tells the blackly comic story of Albert Lippincott. Albert is Nestor, New York's mailman extraordinaire-aggressively cheerful, obsessively efficient. But he also has a few things to hide: his habit of reading other people's mail, a nervous breakdown, and a sexually ambiguous entanglement with his sister. Now his supervisors are on to his letter-hoarding compulsion, and there's a throbbing pain under his right arm. Things are closing in on Albert, who will soon be forced to confront, once and for all, his life's failures. Funny and moving, driven by a wild, compulsive interior voice, Mailman is a unique creation, a deeply original American novel. Already optioned to the movies, this astonishing and kinetically charged tale was one of the most exuberantly praised novels of 2003.