Comedown - Paperback

by Rafael Frumkin (Author)

A dazzling epic that follows two very different families in Cleveland across generations, beginning with their patriarchs, who become irrevocably intertwined one fateful night

A blistering dark comedy, Rafael Frumkin's The Comedown is a romp across America, from the Kent State shootings to protest marches in Chicago to the Florida Everglades, that explores delineating lines of race, class, religion, and time.

Scrappy, street smart drug dealer Reggie Marshall has never liked the simpering addict Leland Bloom-Mittwoch, which doesn't stop Leland from looking up to Reggie with puppy-esque devotion. But when a drug deal goes dramatically, tragically wrong and a suitcase (which may or may not contain a quarter of a million dollars) disappears, the two men and their families become hopelessly entangled. It's a mistake that sets in motion a series of events that are odd, captivating, suspenseful, and ultimately inevitable.

Both incendiary and earnest, The Comedown steadfastly catalogs the tangled messes the characters make of their lives, never losing sight of the beauty and power of each family member's capacity for love, be it for money, drugs, or each other.

Author Biography

Rafael Frumkin is an acclaimed author of fiction and nonfiction and a professor of creative writing. His first novel, The Comedown, is currently in development with Starz as a comedic drama series executive produced by Regina King and Freddie Highmore. His highly anticipated second novel, Confidence, will be published in Spring 2023 with a story collection, Bugsy, to follow in 2024.

He is a graduate of the Iowa Writers' Workshop and the Medill School of Journalism. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Paris Review, Granta, and Guernica, among others.