"Thorn Tree is a riotous, tragic, sublimely written rampage through the lingering dregs of 1960's cults and crimes." –Jennifer Egan, author of A Visit from the Goon Squad and The Candy House
"Telling a story of crime and heartbreak in the American west,
Thorn Tree is about everything that truly matters: art, family, and especially love. Ludington's novel is hard to put down and impossible to forget." -Lauren Grodstein, author of
We Must Not Think of Ourselves "Max Ludington's
Thorn Tree explores loss, discovery, and intergenerational conflict in the wake of the sixties. With taut, exquisitely modulated prose, he delivers a gut-punch with the ease of a caress." –Rebecca Donner,
New York Times bestselling author of
All the Frequent Troubles of Our Days "Rife with flashes of some of my favorite books, from Dana Spiotta's
Eat the Document to Don DeLillo's
Underworld, Max Ludington has achieved something deep and lasting in
Thorn Tree. This one will draw you in and keep you thinking long after you've read its final pages."–Daniel Torday, award-winning author of
The 12th Commandment and
Boomer1 "A vibrant narrative of art, love, and the lingering damage of 1960s excess. . . Readers won't want to put this down." –
Publishers Weekly starred review
"Readers interested in 1960s counterculture and the psychological elements of character development will find this novel engrossing and ultimately suspenseful." –
Booklist " I was enthralled to the end by this novel's willingness to wrestle with the dangerous impulses within us. With
Thorn Tree, one sees how utopia becomes dystopia, grief becomes art, the creator becomes the destroyer, and how love, to a monster, twists into hate." – Edan Lepucki,
New York Times Book Review