A mordant dreamer, the protagonist of this first novel is deliciously at odds with his comrades in Russia; in college, the son of Jewish refugees disses a Chechen brute and barely escapes a mugging. … this soulful tale about a perpetual outsider marks a debut well worth celebrating.
–People Magazine
A novel-in-flashes “My Life at First Try” was published by Counterpoint Press in November 2008.
Alex, an unsinkable, self-deprecating optimist, a polymath and contrarian, an escapee from the most tyrannical regime on Earth, comes to America in search of his lost love and freedom. He’s always fighting; from the brutal Chechen at home to the Christian fundamentalists in America. He’s the ultimate wanderer. He never finds what he wants, but it doesn’t stop him from searching. He is a burning bush—always on fire but never turns to ash. A semi-autobiographical novel in stories.
Publishers Weekly described it this way: “This blazingly fast and funny ‘semi-autobiographical’ novel follows a Russian man’s comically earnest pursuit of the American dream.” The novel is available in book stores nationwide and it received good reviews from Kirkus Review, Booklist, Publishers Weekly, The San Francisco Chronicle, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, Time Out Chicago, The Bloomsbury Review and was featured in Ingram’s Advance. It received 3.5 stars out of 4 from People Magazine (12/08/08).
The newest review In Moria.
YouTube Excerpt The New Yorker Reviews
The bad news is that a life can’t be declared a success while the person is still living. The good news is that it can’t be declared a failure.
I wish I could say that I wrote this book with a pen of iron with the point of a diamond upon the tablet of my heart. Yet this kind of writing is not my style, and these words have already been taken by a writer infinitely better then I. I wrote this book in its final form on my computer, in the overstuffed comfort of a spare bedroom in my suburban house, but it began to shape in my mind as soon as I discovered what the words “shape” and “mind” are.
It may not be the story of my life as it actually happened, and definitely not as I wish it happened. It’s the story of a typical man of my background and generation, whose dreams, nightmares, desires, failures and accomplishments I still feel inside my skin. Tragedy makes a rich blood meal for a growing plant. Comedy adds water. This book is a balance of both.
Mark Budman
