"Compact yet thought provoking.To read Bachmann with McCarthy is to remain at the threshold, to refuse both sentimental identification and bureaucratic closure. [ The Threshold and the Ledger ] does not claim to unlock Bachmann. It does something more rewarding: it dwells with her, on the threshold, notebook open, attentive." --Ian Ellison, Los Angeles Review of Books "Tom McCarthy supplies the kind of robust, free-ranging reading that [Bachmann] deserves. 'a slow unpacking' of two images in a poem, the threshold and the ledger, that still speak volumes, and that we still desperately need to understand." --Nic Cavell, Rain Taxi "This is a daringly ambitious book that moves from plot summary and linguistic analysis to a panoramic view of the intersection between philosophy and literature. And yet, although the book is overflowing with new ideas and connections, ten on some pages, it isn't a difficult book to read.

I read it in one sitting. It has the depth of Beckett's short book on Proust, Roland Barthes's S/Z , and Sartre's essay on literature. With them, McCarthy's book is a foundation text on what literature is and what it might become. It is an antidote to smug insularity and Little Englandism." -- Richard Clegg, Bookmunch "McCarthy has crafted a crackling literary investigation that will captivate with its close readings.Readers will not only marvel at how the author reads but also at his ability to articulate that experience into something both erudite and accessible."-- Kirkus Reviews.