Last Acts: A Novel
Jan 2024 · Sold by Simon and Schuster
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A NEW YORK TIMES EDITORS’ CHOICE • Winner of the 2025 New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award • National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 Honoree • Shortlisted for the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize for Comic Fiction • “The rarest of things, an authentically tender portrait of father and son...Magnificently humane.” —The Irish Times • “Hilarious, exceptional.” —The New York Times Book Review
A riotous, irreverent yet big-hearted debut novel about a broke father-son duo who go all-in on some of America’s deadliest obsessions.
Even though his firearms store is failing, things are looking up for David Rizzo. His son, Nick, has just recovered after a near-fatal overdose, which means one thing: Rizzo can use Nick’s resurrection to create the most compelling television commercial for a gun emporium the world has ever seen. After all, this is America, Rizzo tells himself. Surely anything is possible. But the relationship between father and son is fragile, mired in mutual disappointment. And when the pair embarks on their scheme to avoid bankruptcy, a high-stakes crash of hijinks, hope, and disaster ensues.
Featuring a cast of unforgettable characters and “honest, high-wire virtuosic writing” (George Saunders) this razor-sharp social satire “pays tribute to gallows humorists like Sam Lipsyte, Gary Shteyngart, Jonathan Tropper, and Jonathan Franzen” (Chicago Review of Books).
A riotous, irreverent yet big-hearted debut novel about a broke father-son duo who go all-in on some of America’s deadliest obsessions.
Even though his firearms store is failing, things are looking up for David Rizzo. His son, Nick, has just recovered after a near-fatal overdose, which means one thing: Rizzo can use Nick’s resurrection to create the most compelling television commercial for a gun emporium the world has ever seen. After all, this is America, Rizzo tells himself. Surely anything is possible. But the relationship between father and son is fragile, mired in mutual disappointment. And when the pair embarks on their scheme to avoid bankruptcy, a high-stakes crash of hijinks, hope, and disaster ensues.
Featuring a cast of unforgettable characters and “honest, high-wire virtuosic writing” (George Saunders) this razor-sharp social satire “pays tribute to gallows humorists like Sam Lipsyte, Gary Shteyngart, Jonathan Tropper, and Jonathan Franzen” (Chicago Review of Books).
A NEW YORK TIMES EDITORS’ CHOICE • Winner of the 2025 New York Public Library Young Lions Fiction Award • National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 Honoree • Shortlisted for the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize for Comic Fiction • “The rarest of things, an authentically tender portrait of father and ...
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About the author
Alexander Sammartino was born in Rhode Island and grew up in Arizona. His debut novel, Last Acts, won the New York Public Library’s Young Lions Fiction Award, was chosen as a New York Times Editors' Choice and National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 Honoree, and was shortlisted for the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize for Comic Fiction. He received his MFA from Syracuse University, and he lives in Brooklyn with his wife and cat. He is the 2026–2027 Mary Ellen von der Heyden Fellow at the New York Public Library's Cullman Center.
Alexander Sammartino was born in Rhode Island and grew up in Arizona. His debut novel, Last Acts, won the New York Public Library’s Young Lions Fiction Award, was chosen as a New York Times Editors' Choice and National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 Honoree, and was shortlisted for the Bollinger Ever...
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