Mount Chicago

A Novel

By: Adam Levin

Narrated by: Dennis Boutsikaris

From the award-winning author of Bubblegum and The Instructions, a daring new novel about the absurdity, the humor, and the tragedy of survivorship.

"Adam Levin is one of our wildest writers and our funniest."–George Saunders, bestselling, award-winning author of Lincoln in the Bardo

A one-in-ten-billion natural disaster devastates Chicago. A Jewish comedian, his most devoted fan, and the city’s mayor must struggle to move forward while the world—quite literally—caves beneath their feet. With this polyphonic tale of Chicago-style politics and political correctness, stand-up comedy and Jewish identity, celebrity, drugs, and animal psychology, Levin has constructed a monument to laughter, love, art, and resilience in an age of spectacular loss.

*Includes a downloadable PDF of images from the book

PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.

©2022 Adam Levin (P)2022 Random House Audio

Critic reviews

“Mount Chicago is a bawdy, mournful, deeply funny, metafictionally ingenious, psychotic, ridiculous and majestic shaggy dog joy. When Levin leads the way, every rabbit hole is a glory hole for the mind, and a secret tunnel to provisional bliss and permanent wisdom. Also recommended for parrot lovers.”—Sam Lipsyte, author of The Ask

"A vast new Chicago novel with the satire and raunchy pulse reminiscent of old-school Roth or Bellow."–Chicago Tribune

Too Long

This would be a much much better book if it was 3/4 as long. Needs editing for the audible version. Since I listen to it in the car I was sort of stuck with listening to more than I wanted to.

Very entertaining

Really great reading holds it together. The story is 70% tangent and 10% story. Loved most of it

Interjections are a literary technique

This performance was amazing. Voices were distinct enough to make an easy listen, and impressions were enough to to track with e.g. "The chicago way of saying" words, but not too distracting. Honestly, I'll be looking for more by this narrator.

I really liked this story. It won't be for everyone, but you might, like me, really like it. The prose is nice, conversational, and vital in a refreshing way.

It's really bothering me that people are saying "it's too long/boring" instead of "I lost attention." It's ok to lose attention, in fact it's important to not get engossed by the texture of your bedroom walls every morning. Sometimes my bedroom walls look like a rich, textural universe-in-itself and most mornings I take that geography entirely for granted. This is not the fault of my wall texture.

Your killing me smalls

Funniest book ever assuming you like books and you like things that are funny so yes ok a great book

Funny, annoying

At times extremely funny, like laugh out loud funny, at times a little too explain-y and a bit of a chore.

4.13 Stars

I was expecting a bit more from this author, especially after last novel, Bubblegum, which was fantastic in every way. Mount Chicago, on the other hand, is just mediocre. There's just not much to get excited about here. That being said, I didn't listen to the entire thing, which is over 20 hours long, and sections of this novel are very entertaining. Also, it peters out towards the end, unfortunately. I probably expect too much from this guy, as he's one of my favorite authors. Still, it's a decent read/listen.

Overall 4.13 stars

great voice

loved it... smart, witty and beautiful, great character development, and truly excellent storytelling, plus good meta stuff

Killing me😂

Hilarious and smart, though likely offensive to some. I don’t know, I loved it, maybe I’m immature. What I want from fiction is something that’s truer than facts, and that’s what Levin provides. Incidentally, I just watched the film ‘Beau is Afraid’ and I suspect that if you liked that film, or if you like Charlie Kaufman’s work, you might like this book. Great narration

repetitive

overall this is a very decent book. I loved the instructions and Bubblegum however I feel like this one missed the mark for me.
I found his prose in incredibly repetitive for example
"Apter liked fish for dinner which is to say he ate fish. the fish he ate lived in the ocean, these fish that came from the ocean tasted like the sea and apter usually loved fish especially fish that came from the ocean."
obviously not a direct quote however once I picked up on this it started driving me to the verge of annoyance. Maybe it's just me. overall it's decent and probably worth a listen. I really wish there was an audiobook for the instructions.

Absurd Metafiction for Those with Patience

Whoa boy. I get that Levin is writing out of a tradition of absurdist literature, but this novel was a trial to get through. Somewhere through all the extended ramblings and shaggy dog stories, the depreciating Jewish humor, and the obnoxious main characters lies a worthy story, but you really have to dig for it. If all you care about is bloviating monologs, and characters who take way too many drugs and focus intensely on minutiae, and stories within stories within stories that add up to nothing, have at it.