Reviews of Dead Languages

“The style in this novel is rich, often beautifully lyrical and unashamedly elaborate…Shields is a talented writer, and in Dead Languages he explores fertile themes with intelligence and verbal energy.” —The New York Times

“From Billy Budd to Billy Bibbitt, characters tormented by stuttering and thus prevented from expressing their most passionate feelings have played a central role in American literature.  But Jeremy Zorn is the first such character to narrate his own story…The result is as touching and funny a rendering of adolescence as The Catcher in the Rye…Dead Languages speaks to everyone who has ever struggled to articulate an emotion and failed to find the words.” —Library Journal

“A fresh, humorous growing-up tale with a bitter twist…Dead Languages communicates its thorny messages with a youthful and passionate grace.” —Boston Globe

“What a truly splendid book this is—beautifully written, poignant, and wise.  I found especially noteworthy its tone of light irony and humor and the absence of sentimentality.” —Chaim Potok

“A beautiful book.  Shields has an addiction to language.  What’s lovely about Dead Languages is that he uses the language he loves to convey the most poignant feelings, and to do it with truth and beauty.” —Walker Percy