Gates of Eden 9780385334389

A contract kill is botched when the hit man phones his boss for further instructions on a wire-tapped phone. A private investigator tangles with a thug and has an ear bitten off. A middle-aged man beheads his wife, then calmly offers an explanation for how she drove him to do it. A Jewish boy watches with wonder the rise and fall of a Hebrew-school rebel.

Welcome to the world of Ethan Coen, one half of the filmmaking team that has unleashed a visionary, brutal, and uproarious portrait of America in such screen classics as Fargo, Miller's Crossing, Blood Simple, and Barton Fink. Now Coen translates that vision to the printed page in fourteen keenly envisioned, sharply etched short stories. Blending parody with pathos, making the heinous heartbreaking, Coen demonstrates his unique gift for stunningly inventive narrative, brutal irony, offbeat characters, and crackling dialogue, delivering everything you would expect from such an original imagination.