Ronald Reagan, My Father ECW Press, Spring 2010
I, Tania 2007 (ECW Press)
Buy : US and international
Buy: Canada and Symbia
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“If punk rock was a book, this would be it. Brian Joseph Davis’ I, Tania—a (super)fictionalized (auto)biography of Patty Hearst—is fast, hard and totally about screwing over the Man. Davis manages to mock the rich, the pig middle class, revolutionaries, the media, Bad News Bears, Don DeLillo and Katie Couric without breaking his stride, all while serving a heaping plop of Marxism for Dummies. But be warned: I, Tania only really appeals to four groups—Weather Underground fugitives who now watch a lot of VH1, pinko-intellectual college students who did a lot of coke in the bathrooms of their elite high schools, terrorists and super-smart post-hip PW readers who use Pop Rocks as their infallible guide to all that’s truly supergroovy in the increasingly balkanized melange of insanity and inanity that is modern pop culture.”
— Alli Katz, Philadelphia Weekly
SLATE said: “When I first pulled Brian Joseph Davis’ I, Tania from the new arrivals shelf, I narcissistically wondered if it was an elaborate hoax. Its apparent themes coincided so perfectly with my personal obsessions—the Symbionese Liberation Army, 1980s sports stars, Marxist-Leninist linguistics, kidnapped heiresses, suicidal rock stars—it seemed like a custom Build-a-Bear of a novel created just for me. ..Rarely have the rules of narrative been more imaginatively ignored—the book is full of guest lists for parties that never happened, urban guerrilla fashion tips, and a glimpse at what a truly revolutionary sex-toy catalog would look like.I, Tania is for people who like comic books but don’t care for the drawings, for readers who enjoy ’70s television and Donald Barthelme, and for fans of The Bad News Bears. If you’ve ever wondered what it would be like to argue the merits of punk rock versus Detroit techno with Katie Couric live on daytime TV, it may well be the book of your fever dreams.”
Portable Altamont 2005 (Coach House Books)
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“An elegant, wise-ass rush of truth, hiding riotous social commentary in slanderous jokes. In Davis’ lyrical aphorisms, celebrity is a dazzling mirror of our most regal fears and dreams, as well as a dinky death rattle…It almost feels like he’s leading a palace coup. A-“ Spin Magazine on Portable Altamont, Dec 2005
“Very funny.”—Ian Svenonius, of Weird War, The Make-Up
“By turns aggressive and hilarious, it’s a twisted assault on mass culture where nothing is sacred and nothing is safe. Blowing things up has never been so much fun.”—National Post
*I was recently informed that the Latin translation of The Amboy Dukes, “You Talk Sunshine, I Breathe Fire” on page 74, is beyond atrocious. Please replace with: Lustratum narras solis, ego ignem iacio
Thanks to JD Davis for the new translation.
