“A brilliant new voice—twitchy, corny, sly, cackling and sad, but most of all, racing with vitality and goosing you to keep up. Boonville is the creepy and hilarious coming-of-age story the territory deserves—not your parents’ Vineland , but your own.” — Jonathan Lethem Boonville is the story of John Gibson, the reluctant heir of an alcoholic grandmother who fled the normalcy of her own “American family” to live in the redwoods-surrounded northern California hole in the wall town of Boonville where she is known as the “squirrel lady.” In her will, she leaves John her decrepit cabin. Needing a change from the pastel and air-conditioned life in Miami, John ditches his girlfriend and condo and heads to Boonville to claim his inheritance. He soon discovers it is not the hippie, free-loving town he assumed it was, and the locals—with the exception of Sarah McKay, a commune-reared "hippie by association"—are not happy to see a new face, especially a handsome outsider. John and Sarah are two young people actively searching for self and community in a small town of misfits, rednecks, and counter-culture burnouts. Boonville is the darkly comic tale of how they try to reassemble the facts of heredity, sexuality, personal expression, love, death, the possibility of an existence without God, and what happens whey they choose to make art from their lives. “Robert Mailer Anderson’s a brilliant new voice—twitchy, corny, sly, cackling and sad, but most of all, racing with vitatlity and goosing you to keep up. Boonville is the creepy and hilarious coming-of-age story the territory deserves—not your parents’ Vineland, but your own.” -- Jonathan Lethem “It’s the funniest first novel by an American writer to come my way since John Kennedy Toole’s A Confederacy of Dunces .” -- Jonathan Yardley, Washington Post Book World "Energetic, abrasive and very funny....What we demand from a novelist like this one is not subtlety but steamroller prose, which is exactly what Boonville delivers." -- New York Times Book Review "Boonville offers a quirky slice of California that’s not for the faint of heart. Anderson is a bold, bright funny writer who keeps the pages turning.” -- Bill Barich “Because I think Boonville by Robert Mailer Anderson is terrific, I am obliged to state that he is not a relative. He has, however, written a most exciting first novel and gives more than a few signs that he could become a member of that vanishing American breed—a major novelist.” -- Norman Mailer “This agreeable goof may prove to be the first genuine cult novel since Tom Robbins went mainstream” -- San Francisco Chronicle “Anderson’s outstanding first novel is a volatile mix of hippies and rednecks, a solitary anarchy-loving deputy named Cal and an illicit-substance indunstry that makes Colombia look like it’s winning the war on drugs.” -- San Francisco Examiner “ Boonville heralds the debut of an engaging, clear-eyed new talent. (Robert Mailer Anderson) is writing as one of the rare members of his emerging generation that brings a true moral and philosophical depth to his edgy subject matter.” -- Naomi Wolf “Anderson’s debut novel is a jolting journey...witty and insightful...” -- Publishers Weekly Surrounded by misfits, rednecks, and counterculture burnouts, John Gibson—the reluctant heir of an alcoholic grandmother—and Sarah McKay—a commune-reared "hippie-by-association"—search for self and community in the hole-of-a-town Boonville. As they try to assemble from the late-twentieth-century jumble of life the facts of sexuality, love, and death, and face the possibility of an existence without God, John and Sarah learn what happens when they dare to try to make art from their lives. Robert Mailer Anderson was born in San Francisco in 1968, three years before his parents were divorced. He was the fifth generation of his family -- a clan comprised largely of railroad workers, San Quentin prison guards, and tamale vendors -- to be raised across the Golden Gate Bridge in San Rafael. He spent every other weekend and summers with his father in Mendocino County, reading, playing sports, and accompanying his father to his business, a home for juvenile delinquents, where young Anderson encountered some "hard cases" who were later convicted of, among other crimes, armed robbery, rape, and murder. One former resident, David Mason, was executed by the state. Several others are on death row. At age fourteen, Anderson moved in with his father "full time" and, due to financial constraints, the group home. He started high school in Ukiah, where he was routinely kicked out of classes. He took a year off from school and played golf. He developed a gambling habit. He began contributing articles to the Anderson Valley Advertiser , where his uncle, Bruce Anderson, was editor and publisher. Eventually, he graduated from Anderson Valley High School in Boonville. He played three varsity sports and was MVP of the NCL III in baseball. He