Point Omega
ABOUT
THE BOOK
An excoriating portrayal of loss and an unnerving post-Iraq discourse mark this brilliant novel of modern America. ‘Point Omega is a treat: the most satisfying and least cryptic of DeLillo’s late novels’ Sunday Telegraph. Richard Elster, a retired secret war adviser, has retreated to a forlorn house in a desert, ‘somewhere south of nowhere’. But his planned isolation is interrupted when he is joined by a young filmmaker intent on documenting his experience in a one-take film. The two men sit on the deck, drinking and talking. Weeks go by. And then Elster’s daughter Jessie visits. When a devastating event follows, all the men’s talk, the accumulated meaning of conversation and isolation, is thrown into question. Written in hypnotic prose, this substantial novel is both a metaphysical meditation and a deeply unsettling mystery, from which one thing emerges: loss, fierce and incomprehensible. (From Publisher)
NOMINATING LIBRARY COMMENTS
Point Omega is a zen-like state of consciousness, which Elster, an old philosopher who lives in the desert wants to achieve. The novel concentrates on the contradiction between the quiet life in the desert and the busy life in the city. Original idea, interesting structure, polished style. Enigmatic book with very strong characters.