The Red-Headed Pilgrim


 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Additional Praise for The Red-Headed Pilgrim
 “The Red-Headed Pilgrim illuminates the sometimes painful reality of what it means to search for meaning and beauty in this world. With quick wit and refreshing humor, Maloney has crafted a coming of age and adulthood story that exposes the gritty underside of idealization without losing all hope. This book was a wild, exuberant ride.” 
 —Madeline Hausmann, Bookpeople (Austin, TX)
 “Just as life does over and over again to its hero, Kevin Maloney’s The Red-Headed Pilgrim knocked me down, picked me up, tickled my ribs, knocked me down again, kicked sand in my face, made my bed in the dirt, and then rubbed my back. It’s John Williams by way of Sam Lipsyte, and it’s not to be missed.”
 —Greg Kornbluh, Downbound Books (Cincinnati, OH)
 “A very funny and rollicking novel about one young man’s often ill-fated quest for authenticity, originality, and beauty in modern times. Part of a generation raised in relative privilege by tv and breakfast cereal, he seeks more than the cog in the machine 9-5 life expected of him in search of unique experience, be it through farming, retail, travel, sex, drugs, rock and roll, all the way to marriage and fatherhood, often falling flat on his face. I devoured this book in one evening and enjoyed his misadventures thoroughly.”
 —Seth Tucker, Carmichael’s Bookstore (Louisville, KY)
 “Kevin is a teen-turning-adult in the 90s, but his journey is classic 1960s/70s: a highly intelligent soul searches for truth and beauty with the aid of various drugs, a deep appreciation of nature and simplicity, openness to spontaneous travel, and strong avoidance of 9-5 jobs. Kevin carelessly becomes a father and husband, and parenthood skyrockets his tendency toward denial. Divorce eventually forces him back home to a 9-5 job. A raucous trip!”
 —Kay Wosewick, Boswell Book Company (Milwaukee, WI)
 “Looking back at young mistakes from middle-age is a time-honored tradition. Especially for those who’ve harbored artistic or utopian dreams (or delusions, as the case may be.) Maloney doesn’t give us the wish-fulfillment ending by having Kevin quit his comfortable job and go back on the road to sound his barbaric yawp, but neither does he close the door on the possibility that some pie-in-the-sky hopes may still come true.”
 —Dmitry Samarov, Neutral Spaces
 “There are pages in here where every.single.sentence is funny.”
 —Joe Walters, Independent Book Review
 “It’s such a goddamn gem of a novel that I can’t help but get swept up in the story of Kevin Maloney: poet, Buddhist, ’shroom-tripper, aloof charmer.”
 —Gene Kwak, author of Go Home, Ricky!
 “Unfailingly affable, often hilarious, sometimes harrowing, The Red-Headed Pilgrim is a künstlerroman—a novel detailing a young person’s development into an artist—that tells the tale of one tall, white, Boho-American male’s staggering path to creative fulfillment. With many detours through the swamps of sex, drugs, farm work, and fatherhood along the way, this novel is filled with deceptively hard-won wisdom, all wrapped in a brightly-colored bow.”
 —Jon Raymond, author of Freebird
 “With a mix of humor, melancholy, and pathos, Kevin Maloney’s memorable novel The Red-Headed Pilgrim follows an office worker through his midlife crisis... Maloney’s prose is expert in its formation. The book’s sections are packed with witty references and sly digs at Kevin’s lack of self-awareness. There are scenes that are downright heartbreaking, too. Indeed, in addition to Kevin’s freewheeling adventures, the novel covers the consequences that adventuring can produce. Kevin enters into a far from ideal marriage, raises a child in that milieu, and works to manage elements of a life that can’t be put back together... fun, adventure-filled novel.”
 —Jeff Fleischer, Foreword Reviews
 “The author maintains a sharp wit and a knack for bringing zany flare to everyday details in his protagonist’s awkward quest to build a life, and the author’s willingness to get laughs at his narrator-doppelgänger’s expense makes for a good use of the form. This funny and openhearted romp will have readers laughing and reflecting on their own misadventures and foibles.”
 —Publishers Weekly
 “I devoured this book. What a beautiful ode to being a fucked up pathetic virgin. The Red-Headed Pilgrim is intimate and vulnerable and sexy in the most raw, uncomfortable, depressing ways. Kevin Maloney, through years of poor decisions and contradictory impulses, shows us what he seemed to always know: there is nothing more powerful than love.”
 —Chelsea Martin, author of Tell Me I’m an Artist
 “A revelation that achieves starry dynamo-level energy from the jump. Maloney’s prose is sharp and vivid, full of trippy precision, and his story is funny, wild, painful and wise. When the road of On the Road runs into shattered middle age, this book is waiting for you.”
 —Sam Lipsyte, author of Hark and The Ask
 “A fascinating novel about what can happen when you pursue beauty above all else. Money, reality, and corporate jobs are the last thing on this narrator’s mind—instead, he’ll go wherever love takes him. Kevin Maloney’s writing will break your heart in the best way, reminding us how difficult life can be when we follow the path towards meaning, understanding, and belonging.”
 —Chelsea Hodson, author of Tonight I’m Someone Else
 “A funny, raw, eccentric novel that made me laugh out loud frequently as I tore through its pages. What I appreciated most about this bittersweet, darkly comic story, though, is how it is tinged so beautifully with hope in the end.”
 —Jami Attenberg, bestselling author of The Middlesteins and All Grown Up
 “Who doesn’t love a good disaster story, told with humor and good grace? ...The main character has hints of those old-school hapless heroes from the pages of Salinger or Brautigan, with a dash of modern day love-able losers like, say, Napoleon Dynamite. It’s a drug and sex fueled Odyssey, with way less violence and death, and hardly any monsters, come to think of it. But I believe you’ll enjoy it all the same.”
 —Arthur Bradford, author of Turtleface and Beyond
 “Kevin Maloney