The Terrible Threes

by Ishmael Reed

Overview

In The Terrible Threes, Ishmael Reed proves that he is one of the most innovative voices in contemporary literature. This adventure into the world of offbeat humor and on-target social criticism is a vision of America in the not-too-distant future, a portrait of a fairy-tale gone awry. This novel begins where The Terrible Twos left off, in the late 1990s, three years after President and former fashion model Dean Clift was laughed out of office, with the nation in chaos and the White House implicated in a covert operation to rid America of surplus people and the Third World of its nuclear weapons. A blend of science fiction, folklore, history, fantasy, social satire, and all out surrealist comedy, The Terrible Threes bears Reed's distinctive voice and message. At once a threat, a promise, a prediction, and the awful truth about the land of the free and the home of the brave, the tale is wholly unforgettable. Once you've seen the world through Reed's eyes, you might never see it the same way again.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781564787415
Publisher:	Dalkey Archive Press
Publication date:	09/01/1999
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	192
File size:	326 KB

About the Author

Ishmael Reed is the author of over twenty-five books—including Mumbo Jumbo, The Last Days of Louisiana Red, Yellow Back Radio Broke-Down and Juice!. He is also a publisher, television producer, songwriter, radio and television commentator, lecturer, and has long been devoted to exploring an alternative black aesthetic: the trickster tradition, or “Neo-Hoodooism” as he calls it. Founder of the Before Columbus Foundation, he taught at the University of California, Berkeley for over thirty years, retiring in 2005. In 2003, he received the coveted Otto Award for political theater.

What People are Saying About This

Max Roach

"Ishmael Reed is the Charlie Parker of American fiction."

Trey Ellis

"Hilarious! Race through this book in a public place only if you don't mind laughing and spitting on yourself in front of strangers."

Editorial Reviews

Like all great American comic spirits from Louis Armstrong to Curly Howard of the Three Stooges, from Richard Pryor to Zora Neale Hurston, Reed relentlessly deciphers his culture, subverts it really.
Gerald Early, New York Times, 5/7/89

Gerald Early

The brightest contributor to American satire since Mark Twain.

Nation

Reed's jazzlike, surreal phantasmagoria is set in the late 1990s, in an America where millions of surps (homeless people) forage for food, while U.S. President Jesse Hatch is a figurehead manipulated by televangelist Rev. Clement Jones, his spiritual adviser. The former president, ex-fashion model Dean Clift (star of The Terrible Twos , this novel's predecessor) has been removed from office but will soon stage a comeback. Among the convoluted subplots, two drive the action: White House communications chief Robert Krantz's ``lone cowboy'' scheme to drop neutron bombs on New York and Miami, then place the blame on Nigeria; and billionaire toymaker Elder Marse's plan to exploit the charisma of dwarfish Rastafarian Black Peter. Reed's uproarious, wisecracking, deadly serious farce swings between the inspired and the heavy-handed, but when he is on target, which is much of the time, he is one of the sharpest socio-political satirists around, hurling pointed barbs at racism, the CIA, women, the Vatican, the New York literary crowd and Americans' demand for instant gratification. (Mar.)

Publishers Weekly - Publisher's Weekly

Reed's eighth novel seems aimed at a select audience filled with unfocused anger. Dystopian in theme, it is set in the late 1990s, and what passes for narration apparently involves Santa Claus's taking over America and punishing assorted villains. The plot, however, exists only to allow Reed to attack his favorite pet peeves and, as an added attraction, sophomorically to hit out at famous folk, regardless of creed or color. Nasty little references abound, with American women the favored target: ``always kvetching and talking about being unhappy, without knowing what they are talking about.'' Though a few satirical jabs hit home, this mean-spirited, hapless little novel strains to be humorous, but alas only adds up to a flat, mildly disturbing embarrassment.-- Charles Shapiro, York Coll., CUNY

Library Journal