Short and Tragic Life of Robert Peace (Hobbs) - Book Reviews

Book Reviews
[A] haunting work of nonfiction with a title that is all too self-explanatory…. Mr. Hobbs writes in a forthright but not florid way about a heartbreaking story…. [He] does a fascinating job of raising…questions, even though he cannot possibly answer them.
Janet Maslin - New York Times Book Review


The Short and Tragic Life of Robert Peace deserves...a turn in the nation’s pulpit from which it can beg us to see the third world America in our midst. Robert Peace, who called his mother “my heart,” was her only and beloved son. But he was our son, too. We are the wondrous country that made him a Yale man. We are the wanting country where even that wasn’t enough to spare him.
Anand Giridharadas - New York Times Book Review


An impressive debut in which keen insights are often strewn amid the narrative like shiny pennies on a dirty sidewalk.
Boston Globe


Hobbs...captures the restlessness and ridiculousness of the sushi set's adult-onset angst with note-perfect acuity and a wry sense of humor.
USA Today


[An] ambitious and darkly contemporary first novel... You don't need to draw the parallels with The Great Gatsby's rootless socialites to hear the slither of snakes in the grass.
Los Angeles Magazine


(Starred review.) A man with seemingly every opportunity loses his way in this compelling biographical saga.... Hobbs reveals a man whose singular experience and charisma made him simultaneously an outsider and a leader in both New Haven and Newark.
Publishers Weekly


Hobbs reconstructs the life and thoughts of Rob Peace—his close friend and roommate for four years at Yale University—after his friend's untimely death.... At its core, the story compels readers to question how much one can really know about another person. —Jessica Spears, Monroe Coll. Lib., Bronx, NY
Library Journal


(Starred review.) Peace navigated the clashing cultures of urban poverty and Ivy League privilege, never quite finding a place where his particular brand of nerdiness and cool could coexist... [Hobbs] set out to offer a full picture of a very complicated individual. Writing with the intimacy of a close friend, Hobbs slowly reveals Peace as far more than a cliché of amazing potential squandered.
Booklist


(Starred review.) Ambitious, moving tale of an inner-city Newark kid who made it to Yale yet succumbed to old demons and economic realities.... An urgent report on the state of American aspirations and a haunting dispatch from forsaken streets.
Kirkus Reviews