Critics' Opinion:
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Published Jun 2023
176 pages
Genre: Literary Fiction
Publication Information
A lonely, lovable, queer mountain lion narrates this star-making fever dream of a novel.
A queer and dangerously hungry mountain lion lives in the drought-devastated land under the Hollywood sign. Lonely and fascinated by humanity's foibles, the lion spends their days protecting a nearby homeless encampment, observing obnoxious hikers complain about their trauma, and, in quiet moments, grappling with the complexities of their gender identity, memories of a vicious father, and the indignities of sentience. "I have so much language in my brain," our lion says, "and nowhere to put it."
When a man-made fire engulfs the encampment, the lion is forced from the hills down into the city the hikers call "ellay." As the lion confronts a carousel of temptations and threats, they take us on a tour that spans the cruel inequalities of Los Angeles and the toll of climate grief, while scrambling to avoid earthquakes, floods, and the noise of their own conflicted psyche. But even when salvation finally seems within reach, they are forced to face down the ultimate question: Do they want to eat a person, or become one?
In elegiac prose woven with humor, imagination, sensuality, and tragedy, Henry Hoke's Open Throat is a marvel of storytelling, a universal journey through a wondrous and menacing world told by a lovable mountain lion. Both feral and vulnerable, profound and playful, Open Throat is a star-making novel that brings mythmaking to real life.
"A mountain lion ekes out a lonely existence below the Hollywood sign in this singular, stunning novel...Hoke's prose is a joy, as it alternatingly charms with malapropisms...and stuns with poetic simplicity...Compassionate, fierce, and bittersweet, this is an unforgettable love letter to the wild." —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"[P]layful...provocative...The economical prose reads like poetry, with enjambment in place of punctuation and frequent paragraph breaks. By turns funny and melancholy, this is a thrilling portrait of alienation." —Publishers Weekly
"Hoke does a fine job with his highly imaginative material, bringing the cougar to vivid life by giving him a fascinating take on the human world and his place in it. Open Throat is a treat for both animal lovers and anyone who appreciates innovative fiction." —Booklist
"I defy you to hear the premise of this sophomore novel from the always-interesting Henry Hoke and not immediately smash that preorder button...a playful, poignant, tragicomic delight." —Lit Hub
"Open Throat is a blinding spotlight beam of a book that I was completely unable and unwilling to put down. I am not convinced Henry Hoke isn't a mountain lion." —Catherine Lacey, author of Pew
"My favorite book of this century so far! I keep putting off writing this blurb because every time I pick up Open Throat I re-read it and fall back in love with this gay-ass big cat and then I have to spend the whole rest of the day thinking about mountain lions and humans and sex and bodies and death and climate change and bad dads and NY v. LA and what is even possible in this world. Henry Hoke is a magician." —Andrea Lawlor, author of Paul Takes the Form of a Mortal Girl
"Open Throat is an instant cult classic and a bloody masterpiece. Rhythmically brilliant, heart-wounding, and scathingly funny, I'm in love with a mountain lion and in awe of this book." ―Melissa Broder, author of Milk Fed
This information about Open Throat was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Henry Hoke is an editor at The Offing and a writer whose work has appeared in No Tokens, Triangle House, Electric Literature, and the flash noir anthology Tiny Crimes. He co-created the performance series in Los Angeles, and has taught at CalArts and the UVA Young Writers Workshop. He lives in New York City.
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