Satire, snarky prose, and wonderful vocabulary are the highlights of this book. The story of Hark Morner who is a guru spouting improved focus using archery imagery to help people deal with their dystopian society is quite amusing. This is the first book I’ve ever read from this author and I enjoyed its craziness and humanity.

Thank you NetGalley.

A satirical send up the concept of gurus worshipping gurus.Highly entertaing funny sharp enjoyed laughed highly recommend.#netgalley #Hark #simon& Schuster

I gave this book a real good try, but I didn’t find any of the advertised satire. Chapter after chapter after chapter just seemed to be a jumble of nonsense. After about a third, I closed the book.

I appreciate the ARC of this book from NetGalley and the publisher, Simon & Schuster. This review is [obviously] my own opinion.

This is a story of a guru. Or, really, the man who unwittingly becomes one due to having just the right thing to say (focus) at the right time (America in the throes of political and spiritual chaos). The guru links the way to enlightenment to archery and makes it all about perfecting the aim. And this mental archery concept becomes insanely popular with a bunch of variedly confused individuals, a few of whom specifically go to great length to popularize the message and the messenger and it is those few who are the main focus of the book. This is my first time reading the author, so I wasn’t sure quite what to expect, despite the ample praise lavished by the way of foreword. Satires are tough to get just right. This one came close. It did well at skewering a particular type of mentality…the first world privilege, upper classes on the verge of moral bankruptcy and the disgustingly wealthy, already past that verge and looking for ways to monetize whatever trends there may be. And the writing here was quite good, the author does some very clever verbal gymnastics and linguistic contortions. The book gets quite dark toward the end, almost incongruously so, but on the second thought it may well be appropriate. It certainly gives the book more of a punch. So as a satire I’d say it succeeds, but being as glib and sardonic as it was… it was a book easy to appreciate intellectually, but difficult to connect to emotionally. It entertained and offered some food for thought, but it didn’t wow. Still an auspicious introduction to an obviously talented author and if you’re in a mood for a skeptical cynical tale, this’ll do the trick. But more along the lines of interesting than, say, awesome. Thanks Netgalley.

Comic, intelligent, and well-written, Hark is worth the visit. The book works as its own story while drawing attention to the genre it sends up. Sam Lipsyte works boldly and creatively.

Snarky, pretentious, satire of modern life. Using a life-affirming cultish guru who got his start giving corporate feel good lectures, the story circles around his bizarre but devoted followers of his mental archery program. Hark is an interesting character, but Michael Valentine he is not. Hope this works better for you than it did for me.