What makes the book work, first and foremost, is that it’s funny—fast and fizzy and dangerous in the way the best stand-up feels improvisatory without ever actually being improv...But beneath the laughs and digressions lies a surprisingly profound book about the costs and consolations of art. Does doing comedy make these people’s lives better? The question is moot, pointless. The last word of that question falls away, has to; the material and the life are the same thing."

—Kirkus, starred review

“This novel is so smart. Camille Bordas has exposed the 'material' of stand-up by making stand-up her material. Writing comedy is difficult enough, but writing comedy bits that fail and comedy bits that succeed requires some brilliance. That brilliance is on display here.”

—Percival Everett, author of James

"What begins as a clever conceit becomes an interrogation of sadness itself. Almost suspended in time, the novel elucidates the irreconcilability of learning and living, of performance and being."

––Rachel Cusk, author of Second Place

“A novel about an MFA program for stand-up comics better be damned funny, and The Material is definitely that. It’s also profound, deeply engrossing, dark and generous, a great novel about humans making art right now.”

––Sam Lipsyte, author of No One Left to Come Looking for You

"Camille Bordas’s novel is wryly funny and painfully awkward, populated by an irresistible cast of overthinkers and second guessers. It’s a deep and illuminating pleasure, full of insights about stand-up comedy, group dynamics, and the inner lives of artists.”

—Tom Perrotta, author of Tracy Flick Can't Win

"Like the most brilliant comedy, The Material is not only very funny, but also incisive and insightful. Reading it, I understood more acutely the thin line between the plausible and the absurd. Come for the laughs, stay for the observations so deadpan and accurate that you may be blinded by your own reflection."

—Ling Ma, author of Bliss Montage and Severance