The Last Language

“The novel’s narrative conceit may seem simple at first, the confession of a narrator — the implication of a reader — but there is nothing simple about The Last Language. […] What duBois has managed here is an extraordinary, sometimes jarring, always contemplative book that posits that, as Wittgenstein puts it, ‘If language is to be a means of communication there must be agreement not only in definitions but also … in judgments.’”

“duBois expertly unspools Angela’s journey to the dock, as the unreliable narrator’s mental state comes increasingly into question […] A sharp, beguiling tale of madness, this is metafiction done right.”

“A thematic companion to Zoë Heller’s Notes on a Scandal and Francine Prose’s Blue Angel, author duBois (The Spectators, 2019) tackles questions of communication, consent, and humanity head-on. [ …] Tautly paced, tackling both grandiose theories of linguistics and the everyday realities of caretaking, The Last Language is hard to put down.”

“duBois walks the high wire with Angela’s audacious and unreliable narration, leaving room for readers to wonder how much of Angela’s telling is true and to what degree she’s manipulated Sam. This clever novel lingers long after the final page.”

“[Jennifer duBois] deftly applies her own fictional spin to the wheel of culture. […] The Last Language, follows a linguistics expert as she forms a relationship with a nonspeaking patient using technology. A master of words writing about language and what it means for relationships and humanity? Count me in.”

“The Last Language is an utterly compelling puzzle of linguistics, perspective, and some version of love. […] a smart intellectual riddle and a mystery with the highest of stakes. Readers will find it unforgettable.”

“In her brilliant novel The Last Language, Jennifer duBois deftly examines the very foundation of consciousness while rendering an exquisitely multilayered love story. Equal parts grace and wit, compassion and erudition, this marvel of a book frequently astonishes with its piercing insight. A provocative, devastating masterpiece.”

“The Last Language explores how language can both create our reality and utterly fail to capture it. As we fall deeply into the mind of the narrator, with her brilliance, humor, and humanity, duBois masterfully allows us to live in the ambiguities that the characters fiercely reject. A hauntingly beautiful, darkly comic, and unforgettable novel.”

“The Last Language left me heartbroken and shaken—adjectives that I reserve for some of my favorite novels. In an emotionally fraught narrative with a solid nod to Humbert Humbert, Angela, our imprisoned narrator, tells the tale of her facilitated communication work with twenty-eight-year-old Sam, with detours and asides that bring forth the book’s many complex ethical, philosophical, and linguistic questions. I will be thinking about this book for a long, long time.”

“A novel of razor-sharp intelligence and devastating emotional power, The Last Language asks how and whether we can ever truly understand each other. DuBois’s fierce and witty writing illuminates every page as her characters explore the possibilities and limits of human communication, empathy, and love.”

“The Last Language is, depending on how you read it, a tragic romance, a manic chronicle of self-deception, or a knife fight with Nabokov—in any case it’s a masterpiece. No one writes with more care and less pity than Jennifer duBois, whose depth of knowledge and insight into other people’s minds is boundless.”

“The Last Language is an absorbing, propulsive, compelling read, a breathless confession full of nuanced complexities surrounding morality and communication and power and love. I was drawn immediately into this book and raced through it, completely absorbed in Angela and Sam’s story, right to the finish line. I mourned it when it was over. Another stunner from Jennifer duBois.”