---
product_id: 20732111
title: "Preparation For The Next Life Paperback – November 3, 2015"
brand: "atticus lish"
price: "9291 Ft"
currency: HUF
in_stock: true
reviews_count: 3
url: https://www.desertcart.hu/products/20732111-preparation-for-the-next-life-paperback-november-3-2015
store_origin: HU
region: Hungary
---

# Preparation For The Next Life Paperback – November 3, 2015

**Brand:** atticus lish
**Price:** 9291 Ft
**Availability:** ✅ In Stock

## Quick Answers

- **What is this?** Preparation For The Next Life Paperback – November 3, 2015 by atticus lish
- **How much does it cost?** 9291 Ft with free shipping
- **Is it available?** Yes, in stock and ready to ship
- **Where can I buy it?** [www.desertcart.hu](https://www.desertcart.hu/products/20732111-preparation-for-the-next-life-paperback-november-3-2015)

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## Description

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## Customer Reviews

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ A New "Great American Novel"
*by P***H on April 11, 2015*

Three quarters of the way through this beautifully grim depiction of life at the bottom, Zou Lei, an illegal immigrant who lives in fear of being thrown in jail again, of losing her barely paying backbreaking job, of seeing Skinner, the physically and mentally scared Iraq war vet who she has fallen in love with fail to surface from his overmedicated nightmares, meets a Muslim who wants to save her.He wants her to come back to the religion she learned a bit about growing up dirt poor in rural Western China:“But, he said , you cannot have these beautiful things if you lead a bad life, if you are sinning, doing what you want. Of course you must live properly and obey the law. He pointed at the bilingual Arabic and English sign over the mosque’s doorway, which he read aloud for her. It said Preparation For The Next Life.”This may be one of the few places in the book in which the author intrudes to include irony. Instead author Atticus Lish describes in loving detail the blasted housing projects, the unending trips for fast food, the meaningful meaningless of running and hiding through the demotic argot of those from Latin America, China, Afghanistan, as they try to survive in the outer orbit of New York City. The title of the book, however points to one of the few times that anything even remotely redemptive enters into the minds of the characters or the unfolding of a plot that we know, from the beginning, will not end well for some. Zou Lei is far more sinned against than sinning. In fact she is far more holy than most who have shrines. Skinner, however, haunted by demons, fights for a soul he lost in the killing zones. Others have lost their souls in prison or in the pursuit of money. The redemptive act of running may be the way of escaping dark thought. Zou Lei is always running, figuratively and literally. Her story is in some ways an update of Huck Finn-- a mattress for raft and then lighting out for the territories--and in this she may be more American than most of us.The book has earned some rave reviews for its poetic prose put into service to give the largely voiceless to the voiceless. It’s not as if there are not millions who speak and live like Lish depicts; it’s just that they don’t write books or appear often in the media except when they are arrested or are themselves the victims of crimes. Lish’s sentences are clear and clean but also have a ‘deluging onwardness’ that makes what happens seems fated.For those who want to read a writer using all his skills to bring readers into this world that so few seems prepared for, then I would encourage you to read this book. It is one of the better novels I have read in the past few years.

### ⭐⭐⭐⭐ Kurdish Yazidi Veteran
*by S***L on October 20, 2024*

I read the book a few years ago around 2019/2020 [Kindle Edition], and again in 2024 [Print Edition].I myself am of both German and Kurdish Yazidi Ethnicity, and somewhat familiar with the US Military.The Iraq War was of utter importance for geo-political reasons and similar to the Vietnam War, subject to media exposure and social movements.I recommend the book for those whom cannot sleep and are yet tired. I am utterly against unlawful immigration and a strong supporter of US Border Patrol and Frontex.Post Scriptum: The author seems to have more publications, including 'The War For Gloria' [I did not read it]. I interpret it as reference to the German Bundeswehr [German Armed Forces], genuine people.

### ⭐⭐⭐ Brilliant, unique writing period. Unfortunate errors.
*by J***S on May 18, 2015*

This is a stunning piece of work and I am sorry to see that it has made very few sales despite the awards and the reviews. Some of the reviewers didn't do it any favors with the 'the American dream is dead' business and 'crushing oppression of the lives of illegal immigrants' because people are getting head-shy about propaganda. Who needs an author telling readers how dreadful America is yet again. But the writing is more than exceptional; it is superb. I am at the point of gushing. The streets are a living river of types, sorts, activity, color, woodsmoke from shish-kebabs roasting over charcoal, herb medicine bodegas, Chinatown languages, written with passion and delight.Part of the brilliance of the writing is Lish's love for his characters and setting and part that he is simply gifted. A kind of passionate commitment gives an airborne quality to his prose. There are rewards in every paragraph: "The whole street was meseras bars with Central American men sitting stone drunk at the tables, their hoods over their heads, holding forties, using the bottle to climb up like a bannister'. And 'There were clotheslines hanging on second-story decks. Hanging in the dark he saw a flag with a crescent moon. A blue flickering light showed in a window and they heard gunshots, sirens, and muffled music'. He never tries for effect or twists language in order to extract some poetic quality, it's spare and quick. A relief from the flat, inert prose of Eggars and Tartt et al.The two main characters start out well, and then unfortunately fall into the trap of the passive victim character (in the main, it is Skinner the vet who is passive victim here) and a passive victim cannot carry the weight of a long narrative which is a common problem and probably the reason the book has not sold well despite much boosting. The whole structure collapses; the main character, the Pitiful Victim, cannot carry the weight of a narrative for very long if at all. A story simply cannot maintain its momentum, without agency, without brains, without energy. So the writer sees that his/her story is bagging out at the bottom and the easy solution is to have more and more horrible things happen to the Victim character in order to keep up the tension or the interest.However this does not really work. The readers gets compassion fatigue and thinks, 'do something to help yourself!'. A fatal thought. Then the writer has to work up elaborate circumstances as to why the Victim *cannot* help themselves. The world is too harsh, circumstances are too difficult, the Army refuses medical help and so on. Skinner rents a basement room from some very evil and entertaining rednecks (as usual the evil ones are given the agency, strength cunning etc. as opposed to our limp hero) and they become more and more threatening and evil. Why doesn't he move out? Get another room somewhere, get away from them! Why doesn't he marry Zooey, the Chinese immigrant girl? She's a treasure. And then the reader starts trying to write the book for the author. And then gives up.The main character, Skinner the vet, therefore gets stupider as the book progresses.An additional problem is the clichés; there must be hundreds of books and movies both casting US soldiers as clumsy oafs, low IQ, and sometimes outright savages who wander amidst apocalyptic smoking ruins and are blown up by IEDs and only fight civilians. I can't recall one scene in any of these fictional narratives where US soldiers are up against an armed and competent enemy and yet they all come home with serious PTSD (which in the main comes from being shot at and fighting for your life) and at home begin a long program of drink and failure. The author states that a soldier with traumatic brain injury is returned to combat. I don't believe it. Message: the US army is evil, George Bush is the Evil Lord of All Evilness,no one recovers from PTSD, etc. etc. Readers have also been burnt out on these themes.All men who have been in combat have PTSD going back to the Paleolithic but the import of all the present novels of Iraq is that our current generation of soldiers is more fragile, stupider, less resilient than all the generations before. This started with Vietnam and nothing had changed in the fictional world in 50 years. it's like a stage set an author can rent out; Wars To Go. The relationship of this theme to reality is tenuous; as a commenter on the book Yellow Bird said, "Being shot at is fun. Shooting back is even more fun".The girl is a delight; she is a lively and good young woman, quick as mercury and charming. Love is hard to come by in literary fiction; (LitLit.) I am grateful for her presence. (even though it is another current cliché; strong woman, weak, damaged man). Lish's gift for the written word is so extensive that he can swing into the language of folk tales with ease, it is convincing, hypnotic. The symbols in these folk tales guard her and guide her throughout the book. It works beautifully.So they skid right on down to Sadville to the required awful ending. Zooey goes on a epic journey on foot through New York and the boroughs searching for Skinner like a female Orpheus trying to rescue a male Euripides from hell. It is gripping because of her.A hero narrative is a intriguing question. Does a hero have to be a low-IQ kill machine? Do they have thoughts? Frontal lobes? Writers seem confused by this question except for girl heroes in PopLit, who kill people deader than mackerels and hike many miles carrying a heavy narrative and seem intelligent. Why can men not be heroes? You wonder. Epics going back to the Bronze Age and I am sure beyond supply templates and even beyond the fighting business there are moments of deep insight. For instance Joshua on his way to take Jericho. "When Joshua came to Jericho he lifted up his eyes and looked and there stood a man with his sword drawn in his hand. And Joshua said, 'Are you for us or for our enemies?' and the man said, 'Neither. But as commander of the forces of the Lord I am now come'." This cosmic even-handedness is chilling. And it brings a third party into the equation. It takes some thinking about. But Jericho fell. That's the story.

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*Product available on Desertcart Hungary*
*Store origin: HU*
*Last updated: 2026-03-02*