THE JOPPENBERGH JUMP

Mark Morganstern

THE JOPPENBERGH JUMP

Mark Morganstern

The Joppenbergh Jump Cover
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THE JOPPENBERGH JUMP

A novel

Sergeant Coot Friedman comes back from the Afghanistan War to an upstate New York village nestled at the foot of a legendary mountain. But for a man with a wayward mind, going home is not easy. He tangles with small town mayhem, certifiably crazy characters, ghosts, visions, and dark forces—both those wearing suits and the more mystical variety. And throughout it all, maintains his taste for good beer.

Sergeant Coot Friedman comes back from the Afghanistan War to an upstate New York village nestled at the foot of a legendary mountain. But for a man with a wayward mind, going home is not easy. He tangles with small town mayhem, certifiably crazy characters, ghosts, visions, and dark forces—both those wearing suits and the more mystical variety. And throughout it all, maintains his taste for good beer.

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Reviews

A trippy but emotionally resonant tale about acclimating to life after war.
A trippy but emotionally resonant tale about acclimating to life after war.
There are shady developers and misguided do-gooders and a riotous, realistic diversity on every level.... Morganstern just keeps getting better as a writer. He's off-the-wall, hilarious, heart-wrenching and eloquent.
—Anne Pyburn Craig, BlueStone Press
There are shady developers and misguided do-gooders and a riotous, realistic diversity on every level.... Morganstern just keeps getting better as a writer. He's off-the-wall, hilarious, heart-wrenching and eloquent.
—Anne Pyburn Craig, BlueStone Press
Morganstern has made a quantum leap in rendering the theme of transcendence. The Joppenbergh Jump being his modus operandi, we ultimately find ourselves soaring with Coot high above the intersection of fiction and history—in Rosendale USA, where the spirit of a richly vibrant place is now documented in a novel that might be made up, but still contains a lot of truth.
—Mark Spitzer, author & professor, in Lightwood (read full review here »)
Morganstern has made a quantum leap in rendering the theme of transcendence. The Joppenbergh Jump being his modus operandi, we ultimately find ourselves soaring with Coot high above the intersection of fiction and history—in Rosendale USA, where the spirit of a richly vibrant place is now documented in a novel that might be made up, but still contains a lot of truth.
—Mark Spitzer, author & professor, in Lightwood (read full review here »)
The reader gets hooked in right from the get-go, as the author successfully establishes Coot’s distinctive voice. Imagine a slightly mad, fundamentally good-hearted vet with a propensity for messing up his life and the wry, observant, world-weary humor of a detective from a Forties noir novel and you’ll get the general tone.... The sense of place evoked in The Joppenbergh Jump has a life of its own that should translate well anywhere – in the same way that Joyce’s Dublin, Faulkner’s Yoknapatawpha County or García Marquez’s Macondo resonate for audiences worldwide.
—Francis Marion Platt, HudsonValleyOne (read full review here if you are a subscriber to HV1 »)
The reader gets hooked in right from the get-go, as the author successfully establishes Coot’s distinctive voice. Imagine a slightly mad, fundamentally good-hearted vet with a propensity for messing up his life and the wry, observant, world-weary humor of a detective from a Forties noir novel and you’ll get the general tone.... The sense of place evoked in The Joppenbergh Jump has a life of its own that should translate well anywhere – in the same way that Joyce’s Dublin, Faulkner’s Yoknapatawpha County or García Marquez’s Macondo resonate for audiences worldwide.
—Francis Marion Platt, HudsonValleyOne (read full review here if you are a subscriber to HV1 »)

Among the mad hallucinations of a damaged veteran who has a mystical relationship with a mountain, and the sharply-observed eccentricities of a small town, Morganstern discovers the basic goodness of humanity. He reveals sanity at the heart of madness and chaos, and he does so with wry humor and earthy warmth. A wild and roiling ride.
—Tom Newton, winner of the Dactyl Foundation Literary Award for Seven Cries of Delight

Among the mad hallucinations of a damaged veteran who has a mystical relationship with a mountain, and the sharply-observed eccentricities of a small town, Morganstern discovers the basic goodness of humanity. He reveals sanity at the heart of madness and chaos, and he does so with wry humor and earthy warmth. A wild and roiling ride.
—Tom Newton, winner of the Dactyl Foundation Literary Award for Seven Cries of Delight.

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Excerpt from The Joppenbergh Jump

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About the author

Mark Morganstern left a budding music career behind when he realized he didn't want to play weddings in a cover band. He parlayed a long-term literary interest into an MA in Creative Writing from the City University of New York, subsequently subbing in a high school and booking music acts in his family cafe. These days, he writes, submits, files rejections, gets published. He believes in fiction.

Mark Morganstern
Mark Morganstern

Mark Morganstern left a budding music career behind when he realized he didn't want to play weddings in a cover band. He parlayed a long-term literary interest into an MA in Creative Writing from the City University of New York, subsequently subbing in a high school and booking music acts in his family cafe. These days, he writes, submits, files rejections, gets published. He believes in fiction.

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