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A Novel
by William Peter Blatty
Bestselling author William Peter Blatty warms our hearts with a funny yet deeply moving nostalgic tale of memory, mystery ... and miracles.
New York, 1941: Joey El Bueno is just a smart-aleck kid, confounding the nuns and bullies at St. Stephen’s school on East 28th Street when he first meets Jane Bent, a freckle-faced girl with red pigtails and yellow smiley-face barrettes who seems to know him better than he knows himself. A magical afternoon at the movies, watching Cary Grant in Gunga Din, is the beginning of a puzzling friendship that soon leaves Joey baffled and bewildered.
Jane is like nobody he has ever met. She comes and goes at will, nobody else seems to have heard of her, and is it true that she once levitated six feet off the ground at the refreshment counter of the old Superior movie house on Third Avenue? Joey, an avid reader of pulp magazines and comic books, is no stranger to amazing stories, but Jane is a bewitching enigma that keeps him guessing for the rest of his life - until, finally, it all makes sense.
Rich with the warmth of a bygone era, Crazy captures both the giddy craziness of youth - and the sublime possibilities of existence.
"As readers attempt to puzzle out whether Joey (the narrator) has broken through the time-space continuum, they will be treated to an entertaining romp through the Lower East Side conducted by an inimitable tour guide." - Booklist
"Crazy left me with a smile on my face and a tear in my eye." - Dread Central
"Cheerful though unsubstantial, this novel will please nostalgia seekers but will disappoint readers who associate Blatty with spewed pea soup." - Publishers Weekly
"Nostalgia, sentimentality and irreverent comedy redeem a paper-thin plot ..." - Kirkus
This information about Crazy 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.
William Peter Blatty is best known for his bestselling novel The Exorcist. Blatty also cowrote the screenplay of the Inspector Clouseau film, A Shot in the Dark. He lives with his wife and a son in Maryland.
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