The Dog of the North

fields of brussels sprouts and artichokes flanking the highway. A rotten smell, like that from the neglected vegetable bin at the bottom of my last refrigerator, was blowing in. Despite the fact that I was finished with Sherman, I wondered where he was and what he was doing, and if I'd always wonder, no matter how humiliating the final days of our time together. For instance, last month, pouring Sherman's dirty clothes into the washer, I discovered a slightly worn pink thong. "Yuck, what's this?" I said.

"Oh. I found a bag of stuff at a bus stop. Thought maybe you might like it."

Repulsed, I held up the abbreviated scrap. "But the back part went up somebody else's buttock crevice."

"Can't you just say crack like everybody else?" Sherman said with disgust, peeling back yet another layer of his true feelings toward me.

"Sure. Whose crack was it anyway?" Nothing but anguish would compel me to say a thing like that.


Eventually I boarded the train and settled in. Just after the Zephyr left the station, the train door whooshed open, ushering in a cloud of patchouli oil and the sound of jingling metal objects. A woman came up the aisle and purposefully took the seat across from me. Small brass bells and coins had been sewn onto her billowy patchwork skirt. She then made eye contact and asked if I d like to have my palm read for twenty dollars.

Twenty dollars was a lot to me, but there I was, heading off into a great unknown. Once I dealt with the issues in Santa Barbara, my future was up for grabs. I was like the strand of hair blowing out the window, uprooted, alone. If ever there was a time I might want my palm read, this was it. So I agreed to it and she took my right hand and began to study the fleshy side, tracing her finger along some of the lines. At last she said, "I can see that in your past lives you experienced many episodes of aggression. Here"-she pointed to a place where t

readers who like their books odd, haunting, strange and surprising . . . Through Penny s eyes, we see the beauty in the seemingly broken, in the flawed stories we tell ourselves and what happens when those stories delightfully shatter. Freya Sachs, BookPage

What a wonderfully weird yet deeply familiar world Elizabeth McKenzie has sketched in The Dog of the North! These pages are full of the absurdly funny alongside the absurdly tragic hairpieces, talking fish, disappeared parents, a scalpel-happy grandmother, gastrointestinal disasters the strangeness is not mere quirk. McKenzie s brilliance lies in her deadpan gaze and cool wit, which shows us how inherently odd reality itself is. Families are odd. Homes are odd. California is odd. Dogs and hair and steak and trout are odd. Look up from this book and feel understood in your own inexplicable oddity. A joy, a pleasure, and an addictive read with an ultimately hopeful core that recalls Haruki Murakami, Sayaka Murata, Richard Brautigan, and Miranda July. Sanjena Sathian, author of Gold Diggers

Elizabeth McKenzie has a unique gift for turning the messiness of families and their unfinished business into poignant comedy. You will fall in love with this extended clan of misfits, even after they break your heart. Charlie Jane Anders, author of Victories Greater than Death

Darkly absurd and slyly insightful, Elizabeth McKenzie's The Dog of the North charms and delights even as it wrestles with childhood trauma, bodily indignity, and sudden death. This is a whirlwind picaresque, a genuinely comic novel, and most surprising and most satisfying a potent, poignant investigation into grief and the myriad ways we flailingly, failingly attempt to avoid the pains of loss. Miranda Popkey, author of Topics of Conversation

Sometimes the modern world seems like an inescapable hellscape. Then I remember that Elizabeth McKenzie is writing novels, and I feel better again. The Dog of the North is exactly as much fun as The Big Lebowski or one of Charles Portis's comic jaunts, filled with dialogue so fun you'll want to say it aloud and a blissful parade American eccentrics. Trust me there's a guy who tries to invent something called Steak in a Trout . Ed Park, author of Personal Days

The Dog of The North filled me with joy, a glorious feeling in these times. I laughed out loud on every page and underlined most of the book passages to return to.  The novel in several different dimensions is about caretaking, a role that most people stumble into, don t plan on, and suddenly, wham, there you are doing this task for which you may or may not be prepared.  Each person in the book in her/his own way is taking care at some level, even if he/she is wrong headed (or insane) in the approach.  Thank you, thank you, Elizabeth McKenzie! Jane Hamilton, author of The Excellent Lombards
 
Compassionate, funny, quirky, and beautifully written, Elizabeth McKenzie's The Dog of the North is a novel of our moment. McKenzie spins an exquisitely-wrought tale about the contemporary precariat, health woes, fraying relationships, and the durability of friendship, which she sets within the early midlife walkabout. A triumph! Yxta Maya Murray, author of Art Is Everything

Even funnier, even more romantic than McKenzie's wonderful last, The Portable Veblen, this is a screwball comedy worthy of a Preston Sturgis screenplay.  You will be surprised, delighted, and grateful to be aboard The Dog of the North with the admirable Penny Rush as she faces every challenge her wild and crazy family can throw at her. A book that lifts the spirits. Karen Joy Fowler, author of Booth