‘Deer Hunting with Jesus is one of those rare books that is colourful, depressing, hilarious, and biting all at the same time. Joe Bageant has given us a glimpse into the vicious class war that is too often ignored or hidden by those happily perpetrating this war.’
David Sirota, author of Hostile Takeover
‘This book is righteous, self-righteous, exhilarating, and aggravating. By God, it’s a raging, hilarious, and profane love song to the great American redneck. As a blue state man with a red state childhood, I have been waiting for this book for years. We ignore its message at our peril.’
Sherman Alexie, author of Reservation Blues
‘This fine book sheds a devastating light on Bush & Co.’s notorious ‘base’, i.e. America’s white working class, whose members have been ravaged by the very party that purports to take their side. Meanwhile, the left has largely turned them out, or even laughed at their predicament. Of their degraded state — and, therefore, ours — Joe Bageant writes like an avenging angel.’
Mark Crispin Miller, author of Fooled Again: the real case for election reform
‘Joe Bageant is the Sartre of Appalachia. His white-hot bourbon-fuelled prose shreds through the lies of our times like a weed-whacker in overdrive. Deer Hunting with Jesus is a deliciously vicious and wickedly funny chronicle of a thinking man’s life in God's own backwoods.’
Jeffrey St. Clair, author of Grand Theft Pentagon, and co-editor of CounterPunch
‘The single most insightful book about America available — written in fluid, hilarious prose by one of the great American writers of his generation.’
Charles Firth
‘Passionate, opinionated, wise and true, this is the best book about the imminent death of the dis-United States you will read this year.’
Simon Hughes, ‘Book of the Month’, The Australian Financial Review Magazine
‘This is a wonderful scream of rage at how Karl Rove and his cohorts have persuaded a mass of Americans to vote against their best interests.’
Bruce Elder, Sydney Morning Herald
‘Joe Bageant must be one of only a handful of people who can provide an understanding of what America's redneck underclass is thinking. The mix of storytelling and political commentary is superb … brilliant.’
Herald Sun
‘To understand why dirt-poor white American earning $9 an hour, no health insurance and no job security, are fiercely patriotic, hate unions and proudly vote Republican, read this book ... Brilliant.’
Frank Walker, Sun Herald
‘Joe Bageant must be one of only a handful of people who can provide an understanding of what America's redneck underclass is thinking. The mix of storytelling and political commentary is superb.’
Tim Jamieson, Daily Telegraph
‘Bageant mixes a reporter's keen analysis, a storyteller's colour, and a native son's love of his roots in this absorbing dissection of America's working poor ... wise, tender, and acerbic.’ STARRED REVIEW
Booklist
‘Bageant has real empathy for the working poor, sketching their lives with humour and compassion.’
John Wishart, Australian Options
‘Dead serious and damn funny ... Bageant writes with the ghosts of Hunter S. Thompson, Will Rogers, and Frank Zappa kibitzing over his shoulder ... [T]akes Thomas Frank’s What’s the Matter With Kansas, to the next level.’
Mother Jones
‘Hilariously funny, very angry, and somewhat depressing … The one book I read in 2007 that I would like all of you to read.’
Atlanta Journal-Constitution
‘Informative, infuriating, terrifying, scintillating … Imagine a cross between Thomas Frank’s What’s the Matter with Kansas?, Hunter S. Thompson’s booze-and-dope-fuelled meditations on Nixon’s political potency, and C. Wright Mills’s understanding of the durability of the power elite.’
The American Prospect
‘Mixing folksy populism with the lacerating fury of Hunter S. Thompson, Bageant’s bitingly funny report can at times make Michael Moore seem tame. While Hunting may leave you heartsick, it’s hard to turn away.’
Entertainment Weekly
‘Deer Hunting With Jesus reads … like the inciting manifesto for the Occupy movement. Written by the too-soon-dead author Joe Bageant … spent years blogging on socially forward sites in his gruff, straight-up Southern manner and this book compresses his musings into one funny, loving, thought-provoking book about rednecks.’
Metro
‘A raucous mix of storytelling and political commentary, Deer Hunting with Jesus is Bageant's report on what he learned by coming home.’
Campus Review
