“Business” is a semi-dark, semi-comic, semi-serious coming-of-age odyssey that reminded me, perhaps inaccurately, of Thomas Pynchon. This debut novel’s malleable hero ditches a no-hope writing job for apprenticeship with a flamboyant wheeler and dealer running “the Business.” Their outrageous edge-of-capitalism projects slide into chaos, and our hero finds himself driving across America on a surreal (but strangely normalised) road trip that brings together a captivating immigrant, fearsome gangsters, and PTSD cultists. What began as a satire on voracious capitalism morphs into a tale of existential yearning and learning. The author’s style is sharp and mordant, the world is drawn starkly, and the dialogue crackles. Business is a dislocating yet brisk journey across one fractured tangent of modern life, and much can be expected of J.P. Meyboom’s future novels.
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