Review
"Wise, scrupulous, resolutely admiring biography Davis is out to remove the slur of moral uptightness and narrow virtue from Malamud's reputation. Gratifyingly, he wants to restore him to the pantheon of great American writers in which Malamud, in our flash-in-the-pan culture, once belonged." --Lee Siegel, New York Times Book Review
"A wonderfully readable, illuminating and entertaining biography It is rare that a biographer succeeds in evoking, with a novelists skill, such compassion for his (flawed, human) subject; yet more rare, that a biographer succeeds in so drawing the reader into the shimmering world he has constructed out of a small infinity of letters, drafts, notes, manuscripts, printed texts, interview transcripts etc, that the barrier between reader and subject becomes near-transparent." --Joyce Carol Oates, Times Literary Supplement
"Davis is frequently insightful." --Mark Oppenheimer, Wall Street Journal
"Mr. Davis has succeeded in evoking a hum
Advance praise from John Gross
"Bernard Malamud is in no danger of being forgotten, but in recent years there has perhaps been a tendency to take him for granted. Philip Davis's admirable biography restores the excitement to his name. It lays bare the unexpected quirks and complexities of his character with sympathy and insight; it throws invaluable light on his story-telling, and at the same time makes a fascinating story in itself."
