The Plight House, a novel by Jason Hrivnak » debut

Full comments from the Oneline Reviews

admin — Tue, 06 Sep 2011 02:08:07 +0000

“This book changed me.

What’s so great about it? Well, it left me in tears, and kept me entranced for several hours while I greedily plowed through it. It’s the most unique thing I’ve ever read, and calling it a novel somehow seems wrong. It’s not structured like a novel, it doesn’t start or end like a novel. It starts rather slowly, actually, and when I went to pass on my tattered and tearstained copy to my partner, I almost wanted to tell him not to read the Prologue. Not because it’s poorly written or anything like that, but because it’s ‘normal’, and unlike the rest of the book. It’s written with a voice that’s simple and gentle, just a man talking about a girl he used to know.

Once you’re through the Prologue and start your journey through The Plight House, there’s no turning back. Don’t read this if you have to be somewhere, if you don’t have time to just give it the undivided attention it deserves. It’s like a guided meditation, it’s like a lucid dream primer, and it’s like a nightmare.

And it’s wonderful. Hrivnak has such a beautiful command of the language, and is undeterred in his creation of The Plight House. Some passages cause you to sink, like entering the ocean with your clothes on. Others are hopeful and uplifting, carrying the reader to heights of imagination and love. This book requires your cerebral and spiritual participation. Once you’ve read it, you will want to give it to anyone you love. Simply flawless.”

— THE ONELINE REVIEWS

the Oneline Reviews >

The Plight House on the Oneline Review website

admin — Sun, 06 Feb 2011 08:02:43 +0000

“The writing unlikely & unique, bizarre with soft exposure strangeness, a zenith of literary bliss; Can-Lit is changed.”

— THE ONELINE REVIEWS

the Oneline Reviews >

“Inspiration for the rest of us”

admin — Mon, 10 Jan 2011 07:18:50 +0000

Blogger Carrie Carm has included The Plight House in her Monday column, Inspiration for the rest of us.

“This week’s inspiration is grief and strange beauty: Jason Hrivnak’s The Plight House, a stunning, deadly book. It’s just so sad and odd and gorgeous.

It is even pleasing as a physical object, all by itself. Published by Pedlar Press out of Toronto and with cover art by Tom Poirier — the book’s official website banner shows it off — it has high-quality, laid paper (with visible chain lines), and the layout of the book leaves plenty of negative space: a book design success.

The content itself is divine.”

— CARRIE CARM

carriecarm >

The Plight House shortlisted for a ReLit Award

admin — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 03:57:01 +0000

The ReLit Awards, now in their tenth year, recognize works published by Canada’s independent presses. Winners will be announced on October 20th at the Ottawa International Writers Festival.

The ReLit website >

Dennis Cooper ♥ The Plight House

admin — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 03:22:21 +0000

Dennis Cooper, author of transgressive classics Closer and Frisk, has included The Plight House (alongside works by Jean-Christophe Valtat and Pascal Quignard) in his recent blog entry “Three books I read recently and loved”.

theweaklings >

Globe and Mail review

admin — Fri, 05 Mar 2010 05:54:42 +0000

“Hrivnak succinctly posits a triple-barrelled theme: grief bound tightly with innocence and guilt … [He] is an elegant and often incisive prose stylist, skilled at image-making and intent on exploring difficult questions of personal and societal responsibility.”

— JIM BARTLEY

Open Book Toronto interview

admin — Sun, 18 Oct 2009 14:34:25 +0000

Pedlar Press publisher Beth Follett interviews Jason Hrivnak about the process of writing The Plight House.

“Bright and alienated youths never really go away and neither, of course, do their scars. That’s the great thing about taking as one’s subject matter the experiences — sickness, insanity, violence, love — that nobody comes through unscathed. The readership of such material isn’t defined by conventional demographic criteria, but, rather, by each individual reader’s willingness to journey into a territory filled with peril, perhaps even pain.”

See the complete interview on the Open Book Toronto website.

Open Book Toronto >

Lynn Crosbie review

admin — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 17:29:51 +0000

“First Rule of The Plight House: everyone talk about The Plight House. Hrivnak writes like a crazy angel in this addictive, astonishing debut.”

— LYNN CROSBIE