The Son [Paperback]

'The Son is an epic, heroic, hallucinatory work of art in which wry modern tropes and savage Western lore hunt together on an endless prairie. No one, ever, has done a novel like this, but if you took One Hundred Years of Solitude as your mare and Blood Meridian as your stud, then spooked the resulting herd of horses and had the cast of The Wire dress as Comanche and ride them hard through the gates of hell, you'd have some kind of idea. This is a horribly tragic, disturbingly comic and fiercely passionate masterpiece of storytelling, bred from painstaking research and magisterial prose and offering up two hundred years of American history in a manner so relentlessly compelling that the reader, in awe, struggles to catch his breath' --Chris Cleave

'Stunning... a book that for once really does deserve to be called a masterpiece' --Kate Atkinson

'The Son has all the hallmarks of an instant classic; it is a big book in scope, in ideas and landscape. It is the best American novel released in the past 12 months, arguably the best American book thus far this century. Think Cormac McCarthy with strong female characters or a more rusticated, visceral Jonathan Franzen' --The Bookseller

'... the stuff of Great American Literature. Like all destined classics [The Son] speaks volumes about humanity our insatiable greed, our inherent frailty, the endless cycle of conquer or be conquered' --Publishers Weekly

'A remarkable, beautifully crafted novel. Meyer tackles large movements of American history and culture yet also delivers page-turning delights of story and character' Charles Frazier, author of Cold Mountain

'The Son is a true American epic, full of brutal poetry and breathtaking panoramas; it's also a beautiful and moving character study of a Texan family. Meyer is a writer of tremendous talent, compassion and ambition, and The Son is a staggering achievement'-- Karen Russell, author of Swamplandia!

'Philipp Meyer redrafts humanity's oldest questions and deepest obsessions into something so raw and dazzling and brutal and real, The Son should come with its own soundtrack' -- Téa Obreht

'Meyer is an impressive and multi-talented story-teller in the old, good sense - the kind that makes me hang on for whatever the next chapter will hold' --Richard Ford

'An epic in the tradition of Faulkner and Melville, this is the work of a writer at the height of his power' Kevin Powers, author of The Yellow Birds


'Philipp Meyer came to my attention with his brilliant novel American Rust, about two hopeful students in a cash-strapped modern America. His epic new book The Son is a brilliant, beautiful coming-of-age story that encapsulates the whole American Dream: a masterpiece of American literature that captures the expanse and possibilities of the country. Hold onto your Stetsons, it's one hell of a read' --Patrick Neale, Bookseller's Choice

'I could no more convey the scope of The Son than I could capture the boundless plains of Texas. [A] monumental novel' Washington Post --Washington Post

'A brutal and gripping Texan family saga heralds the emergence of a new master of the western genre...The Son is a supremely immersive saga, one that lassos the reader with its first, thrilling immediate set piece...and does not release you until its anti-hero's concluding act of vengeance on the last dregs of the Apache. The Son is a remarkable achievement...not since the baroque character of Judge Holden, the hulking scalphunter-polymath who stalks McCarthy's Blood Meridian, has the Wild West produced such a grimly compelling creation.' --Sunday Times

'A fresh take on The American Dream set against the backdrop of Texan history, this is sure to be a page turning slice of literature' --Attitude



'The Son is epic, spanning 500 pages and 200 years of an American family and the history of Texas...it remains intimate despite the big sweeping themes' --Independent

'Meyer has achieved something extraordinary with The Son. At times it is difficult to believe that Meyer wrote this novel in the present day, such is his ability to bring to life characters submerged under hundreds of years of history' --Independent on Sunday

'Meyer's addictively violent yet elegiac novel of the Old West'-- Evening Standard

'The McCulloughs are determined to have the land and life they want in the American West. Love, honour and even children are sacrificed so the family can become the richest in Texas at huge cost. This book is so wonderfully unique... Enjoy' --The Sun --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Philipp Meyer grew up in Baltimore, dropped out of high school and attended Cornell, where he studied English. Since graduating, Meyer has worked as a derivatives trader and a construction worker. His writing has been published in McSweeney's, The Iowa Review, Salon, and New Stories from the South. From 2005-2008 Meyer was a fellow at the Michener Center for Writers in Austin, Texas. He lives near Ithaca in New York State.