B&N Reads
4/4/2016
Fans will already be familiar with his left-of-center wit, which is on full display from the opening chapter, a prologue set 4,000 years ago (“give or take”) that finds the angel Qaphsiel on the brink of destroying the world using the titular doomsday device. The only problem is, after many ominous proclamations, he is about to unleash the apocalypse (Lord's orders!), when he realizes he has…er, misplaced the object. With mankind's destruction on hold, the angel can do nothing but utter one rather less-than-angelic phrase: “Oh, crap.” Read More
From the Publisher
Richard Kadrey’s The Everything Box is a manic and hilarious Venn diagram of Elmore Leonard, Dave Barry, and the Book of Revelations. The last time the end of the world in a novel was this funny, aliens destroyed Earth to build a hyperspace bypass through it.” — Matt Wallace, author of Envy of Angels and Lustlocked on THE EVERYTHING BOX
“This book has everything I need in a book, and some things I didn’t know I needed. I couldn’t stop laughing at the freelance poltergeists, inept angels, doomsday devices, mooning werewolves (...mooning werewolf. I just got that), and small time career criminals in way over their heads. Highly recommended.” — Mur Lafferty, author of The Shambling Guide to New York on THE EVERYTHING BOX
“The story is fast paced, very funny, and exceptionally clever. Kudos to this author!” — Suspense Magazine on THE EVERYTHING BOX
“A supernatural comic caper that reads like one of the late Donald Westlake’s Dortmunder novels sprinkled with some fairy dust.” — Kirkus Reviews on THE EVERYTHING BOX
“Kadrey’s plot doesn’t depend on magic; instead, magic is the broth bringing all manner of delicious ingredients together in this wonderful stew of a story. This unusual urban fantasy is a delight.” — Publishers Weekly on THE EVERYTHING BOX
“A rolling bouncy-house of a caper tale, The Everything Box abounds with quick-witted characters, snarky dialogue, and surreal analogies. If you haven’t sampled Richard Kadrey’s take on fantasy yet, this is a great place to start.” — Christopher Moore, New York Times bestselling author of Lamb, A Dirty Job, and The Serpent of Venice on THE EVERYTHING BOX
“Fans of the Sandman Slim novels as well as newcomers wo the author will be thrilled by this fast-paced, smart-mouthed adventure.” — B&N Sci-Fi & Fantasy Blog on THE EVERYTHING BOX
“[Kadrey] can make Hell funnier than you’d believe. Raymond Chandler meets Good Omens, in which multiple doomsday cults, secret government agencies, and crooks of every description compete to retrieve the box, a perfect McGuffin, a Maltese Falcon with the power to destroy all of Creation.” — Cory Doctorow, BoingBoing on THE EVERYTHING BOX
“Kadrey’s simultaneously glib and snide voice [peppers] his story with delightful turns of phrase...The Everything Box is a fun read for all of the Kadrey-isms alone.” — Locus Magazine on THE EVERYTHING BOX
“His books are a romp... and they go down like cold lager on a hot afternoon. He’ll hit you with the heavy stuff... but he’ll give it to you in the first couple pages, cover it in stripper glitter, and have someone get socked in the nose.” — NPR Books on THE EVERYTHING BOX
“Hilarious, exciting, poignant, romantic, horrifying, and absurd in the very best way . . .” — New York Journal of Books on THE EVERYTHING BOX
“Richard Kadrey’s work has often possessed a dark, satirical edge, but in “The Everything Box,” the San Francisco author allows himself to venture far into the realm of the outright silly…reminiscent of the comic novels of Christopher Moore, Neil Gaiman or Terry Pratchett” — San Francisco Chronicle on THE EVERYTHING BOX
“Mr. Kadrey’s invention never flags. He always has another joke up his sleeve. Even if the joke is on us and our ability to drag the Heavenly Hosts themselves down to street level, and then corrupt them.” — Wall Street Journal on THE EVERYTHING BOX
Mur Lafferty
This book has everything I need in a book, and some things I didn’t know I needed. I couldn’t stop laughing at the freelance poltergeists, inept angels, doomsday devices, mooning werewolves (...mooning werewolf. I just got that), and small time career criminals in way over their heads. Highly recommended.
Matt Wallace
Richard Kadrey’s The Everything Box is a manic and hilarious Venn diagram of Elmore Leonard, Dave Barry, and the Book of Revelations. The last time the end of the world in a novel was this funny, aliens destroyed Earth to build a hyperspace bypass through it.
B&N Sci-Fi & Fantasy Blog on THE EVERYTHING BOX
Fans of the Sandman Slim novels as well as newcomers wo the author will be thrilled by this fast-paced, smart-mouthed adventure.
NPR Books on THE EVERYTHING BOX
His books are a romp... and they go down like cold lager on a hot afternoon. He’ll hit you with the heavy stuff... but he’ll give it to you in the first couple pages, cover it in stripper glitter, and have someone get socked in the nose.
Suspense Magazine on THE EVERYTHING BOX
The story is fast paced, very funny, and exceptionally clever. Kudos to this author!
Locus Magazine on THE EVERYTHING BOX
Kadrey’s simultaneously glib and snide voice [peppers] his story with delightful turns of phrase...The Everything Box is a fun read for all of the Kadrey-isms alone.
Christopher Moore
A rolling bouncy-house of a caper tale, The Everything Box abounds with quick-witted characters, snarky dialogue, and surreal analogies. If you haven’t sampled Richard Kadrey’s take on fantasy yet, this is a great place to start.
Cory Doctorow
[Kadrey] can make Hell funnier than you’d believe. Raymond Chandler meets Good Omens, in which multiple doomsday cults, secret government agencies, and crooks of every description compete to retrieve the box, a perfect McGuffin, a Maltese Falcon with the power to destroy all of Creation.
San Francisco Chronicle on THE EVERYTHING BOX
Richard Kadrey’s work has often possessed a dark, satirical edge, but in “The Everything Box,” the San Francisco author allows himself to venture far into the realm of the outright silly…reminiscent of the comic novels of Christopher Moore, Neil Gaiman or Terry Pratchett
New York Journal of Books on THE EVERYTHING BOX
Hilarious, exciting, poignant, romantic, horrifying, and absurd in the very best way . . .
Wall Street Journal on THE EVERYTHING BOX
Mr. Kadrey’s invention never flags. He always has another joke up his sleeve. Even if the joke is on us and our ability to drag the Heavenly Hosts themselves down to street level, and then corrupt them.
Library Journal
11/15/2015
Not another Sandman Slim novel but the first in a darkly whimsical supernatural tale opening in 22,000 BCE, when an angel loses a device meant to wipe out humanity. (His response? "Crap.") Fast-forward to 2015, when a thief named Coop finds himself in possession of the item. With a 50,000-copy first printing.
APRIL 2017 - AudioFile
The Everything Box is a mystical artifact of great power, lost by a minor angel many millennia ago. Fortunately, this audiobook has narrator Oliver Wyman, an Everything Box in his own right. In 2015, Coop, a thief who specializes in stealing magical objects, is kicked loose early from prison on the condition that he steal the box for a collector. But Coop gets picked up by the Department of Peculiar Science, an agency dedicated to the paranormal, whose members pressure him to steal the box back to keep his freedom. Besides the DPS, there are four other groups that have their own nefarious reasons for wanting the box. With an impressive mix of dialects, accents, and timbres, Wyman brings to life a diverse variety of characters, including a zombie. The result is a rollicking audio caper packed with bizarre creatures. D.E.M. 2017 Audies Finalist © AudioFile 2017, Portland, Maine
Kirkus Reviews
2016-02-04
A thief just out of prison is recruited to steal a powerful magical talisman. Kadrey (Killing Pretty, 2015, etc.) takes a break from his popular Sandman Slim series to offer a stand-alone horror-comedy that pulls heavily from all manner of genres and throws in everything but the kitchen sink. The novel opens 4,000 years ago on an angel, Qaphsiel, who's normally in charge of office supplies for the heavenly host but is on a quick mission to Earth when he loses the titular MacGuffin. Back in the present day, Charlie "Coop" Cooper is using his light-fingered talents and a talkative poltergeist to steal some documents when he's busted by the LAPD's Criminal Thaumaturgy squad. After a quick stint in the pokey, Coop hooks back up with his buddy Morty Ramsey, who's been approached with a pricey breaking and entering job that could net them hundreds of thousands of dollars. An enigmatic client named Mr. Babylon wants to hire Coop to steal a family heirloom from a rival, but he has his doubts about Coop's abilities. "I have something you don't, Mr. Babylon," Coop explains. "Another ability. A rare one. I'm immune to magic. Conjury, enchantments, fascinations, mesmerisms, mind reading, and ladies sawed in half. The whole bit." From here, the book explodes into an overstuffed heist movie complete with a band of duplicitous cronies, two bickering agents from the government's Department of Peculiar Science, a hard-traveling murderer cut from the same cloth as Cormac McCarthy's Anton Chigurh, and a pair of inept cults that are mostly around for comic relief. It's all a bit much to take in, and Kadrey offers a lot of stylistic similarities to Gaiman and Pratchett's superior Good Omens (2009). Nevertheless, there's definitely an audience for this kind of madcap supernatural comedy, and it's likely to find those readers pretty handily. A supernatural comic caper that reads like one of the late Donald Westlake's Dortmunder novels sprinkled with some fairy dust.
