Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk

Ben Fountain Press Reviews

'Brilliant: funny, involving, warm-hearted, a book for our times' -- Rachel Cook Observer

'A fierce, exhilarating novel about the Iraq war ... And it is terrific: eloquent and angry, funny and poignant' -- Theo Tait Guardian

'Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk is not merely good; it's Pulitzer Prize-quality good ... A bracing, fearless and uproarious satire of how contemporary war is waged' San Francisco Chronicle

'Breathtaking, beautiful, startlingly authentic' -- Patrick Hennessey, Author Of The Junior Officers Reading Club

'This book will be the Catch-22 of the Iraq War ... Fountain applies the heat of his wicked sense of humor while you face the truth of who we have become' -- Karl Marlantes

'As close to the Great American Novel as anyone is likely to come these days - an extraordinary work that captures and releases the unquiet spirit of our age, and will probably be remembered as one of the important books of this decade' -- Madison Smartt Bell

'Passionate, irreverent, utterly relevant, Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk offers an unforgettable portrait of a reluctant hero. Ben Fountain writes like a man inspired and his razor sharp exploration of our contemporary ironies will break your heart' -- Margot Livesey

'Too often nowadays even rather good novels fail to excite me - I suppose over the years I've read too many of them - which means that those which do are Events in my life. And now I can add Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk to the list. A blazingly good novel and a vital, important book about war and the world we live in' -- Diana Athill

'Ben Fountain's novel is an exhilarating, funny, heartbreaking glimpse into the life of a young soldier and into experiences in which we are complicit - but about which we understand nothing. And it finds its mark in an incredibly personal way. The book has left me reeling' -- Colin Firth

'It is a masterpiece of war literature, which is always to say, of anti-war literature' Australian Review

'Brilliantly done ... grand, intimate, and joyous' -- Geoff Dyer New York Times Book Review

'[An] inspired, blistering war novel...Though it covers only a few hours, the book is a gripping, eloquent provocation. Class, privilege, power, politics, sex, commerce and the life-or-death dynamics of battle all figure in Billy Lynn's surreal game day experience' New York Times