One of the foremost writers of his generation—or any—at work today, Rick Moody makes this welcome return to Elliott Bay. Author of novels (The Ice Storm, Purple America, The Diviners), novella and story collections (Demonology), and a memoir (The Black Veil), he is here tonight with a wild new novel, The Four Fingers of Death (Little, Brown). "A rollicking romp through deep space and Arizona alike, improbably and thoroughly entertaining, courtesy of master storyteller Moody. Mash up Isaac Asimov with Thomas Pynchon, with dashes of Ray Bradbury and Kurt Vonnegut, and you begin to approach Moody's madcap view of the world. His near-future tale opens in 2024 with a sad sack of a writer named Montese Crandall, who—shades of Twitterous tweets—has been perfecting the art of reducing an epic to a single line ... Moody brings in dozens of characters major and minor ... and not a one of them [is] wasted; as he gamely intertwines their destinies, he switches moods, voice, register and generally has a grand old time twitting the conventions of science fiction and literary narrative alike. It's a big goof, but punctuated by telling commentary about the direction society, the planet and literature are all going—which, suffice it to say, is not an ideal one. A smart, fun satire—Jonathan Swift in space, with twists befitting Vincent Price." – Kirkus Reviews.