Overview

Summer 2020: the Covid-19 Pandemic is raging. A reclusive billionaire, Olive Mixer, calls twelve diverse & lonely Americans to his mansion complex in the Hamptons: nurses, lawyers, mechanics, social workers, students, financial analysts, soldiers, Uber drivers, engineers, hair salon operators. During the day, the guests meet, compete, date, dine, flirt and fight. Each night, one must tell the group a story. Their tales range widely in subject, style, length and decorum. Many stories respond to each other. They trigger passionate debate and fiery resistance. They change how characters perceive each other and affect the trajectory of the frame narrative. They make us ponder the nature of storytelling itself. Bad Americans is part Boccaccio and part The Bachelor, but it is a creation all its own. Both a novel and short story collection, Bad Americans is at once a powerful portrait of the American pandemic experience and an examination of narrative itself. Bad Americans: Part I includes the frame narrative and the first six stories. Bad Americans: Part II will conclude the frame narrative and include six additional stories. These two books are the second and third volumes of the profound and daring anthology series The Human Tragedy, following the subversive classic Good Americans.

Full Product Details

9781734727838

Table of Contents

Reviews

""Desai's greatest strength lies in his ability to craft tales that are gripping in their own distinct ways-each story possesses a haunting quality that refuses to fade from memory long after it's been told. But what makes the collection particularly effective is Desai's timely and necessary exploration of American division, one that manages to find humanity even in our deepest disagreements. Takeaway: Powerful rendering of the human experience uniting a divided America."" -- BookLife Reviews, Publisher's Weekly ""The fictional characters' sentiments are carefully crafted, offering an intriguing range of realistic reactions to the Covid-19 pandemic. An illuminating...exploration of recent history and the people who lived through it."" -- Kirkus Reviews ""Tejas Desai, one of the nation's boldest and most innovative writers, tackles the nature of American identity in Bad Americans, a panoramic tale of exploration and survival during the COVID-19 pandemic. Channeling Boccaccio and Chaucer, Desai sets his novel on the Gatsbyesque estate of dating-app magnate Olive Mixer, who invites each of twelve diverse guests to share their stories on consecutive days. What ensues is a poignant and often hilarious commentary on social experimentation and the individual's search for meaning in a world that co-opts and commodifies identity. Bad Americans is a daring novel as compelling as it is intellectually challenging. -- Jacob M. Appel, author of Einstein's Beach House ""Tejas Desai skillfully examines human nature and Americanism, complete with all of its flaws, frustrations, absurdities, and convolutions. Bad Americans: Part I is an important contribution to our postmodern roaring twenties."" -- Raj Tawney, author of Colorful Palate: A Flavorful Journey Through a Mixed American Experience ""In an age when authors are increasingly turning inward and literature seems to have gotten smaller, Tejas Desai has accomplished the remarkable task of writing about a topic as large as Covid, with a canvas as broad as the United States itself. This is a compelling story that is driven by an extensive cast of characters, each vivid in their own way. It makes for a captivating read."" -- William J. McGee, author of HALF THE CHILD and ATTENTION ALL PASSENGERS ""Timely yet timeless...a genre-defying tour de force...Bad Americans cements Desai's reputation as a writer unafraid to interrogate the complexities of modern life."" -- Sarah Jensen, Goodreads Review

Author Information

Tejas Desai is the author of the Amazon #1 bestselling international crime trilogy The Brotherhood Chronicle (2018-2020), which has won 17 literary honors and has been praised as ""awe-inspiring,"" ""breathtaking,"" ""riveting"" and ""a must read that will keep you guessing."" His panoramic portrait of American society, The Human Tragedy, includes the award-winning Good Americans (2013), which was praised by Kirkus Reviews as ""a solid collection of rare caliber"" that ""speaks volumes about the human condition and modern life in America,"" and the groundbreaking pandemic novel with short stories Bad Americans, which is being released in Parts throughout 2025 and 2026. The founder of The New Wei Literary Arts Collective & Movement, he has been profiled by numerous publications including HuffPost, Buzzfeed and The London Post. He attended Wesleyan University, University of Oxford and holds two Masters degrees, including a MFA in Creative Writing, from CUNY-Queens College. He was born, lives and writes in New York City, where he works as a supervising librarian for Queens Public Library.

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