"This book quite successfully challenges the ideas of Christian moral supremacy and the unchallenged political agenda of superpowers. It is a deeply satisfying novel which excites hopes of a long and productive career for this young writer." - Examiner.com "Furious entertainment. It echoes Michael Chabon's The Yiddish Policeman's Union or Steven Barnes's Lion's Blood , but more comparisons will be made to Philip K. Dick's World War II reimagining The Man in the High Castle ." - The Onion's AV Club "If you amalgamated the methodical, punctilious, world-building skills of Ian McDonald with the reality-distortion powers of Philip K. Dick and then folded in the satirical, take-no-prisoners savagery of Norman Spinrad, you might be able to produce a book approximating The Mirage .
" - Barnes and Nobles Review "That The Mirage shares DNA with airport-kiosk genre exercises is nothing to be ashamed of. A good thriller is hard to pull off. The ingredients are clear enough: propulsive action, sympathetic characterization, and enough detail to ground the story without slowing things down." - The Philadelphia City Paper "An audacious new novel. The Mirage is a topsy-turvy tour de force, another winner from a truly inventive and unpredictable storyteller." - The San Francisco Chronicle "Ruff has constructed a funhouse-mirror mash-up where H.G. Wells and Graham Greene collide with The Arabian Nights and The Matrix .
It's no easy task to recreate the universe in its own, if slightly distorted, image, yet Ruff has succeeded handily, dizzying and dazzling the reader with a fantastic-and fantastical-story." - BookPage "A funhouse-mirror mash-up where H.G. Wells and Graham Greene collide with The Arabian Nights and The Matrix . Ruff dizzies and dazzles the reader with a fantastic-and fantastical-story." - BookPage "Sci-fi/fantasy/post-cyberpunk cult author Matt Ruff imagines an alternate world in which Arabia becomes the earth's dominant superpower and America is a dictator-led, fundamentalist backwater. More than half the fun here comes from discovering all of the intricately clever consequences Ruff derives from that simple premise." - Details "The alt-historical framework is in many ways the best and most entertaining part of the book, and you want it to expand beyond the mere 400 pages of The Mirage .
" - Seattle Weekly "An unnerving but intriguing premise forms the backbone of Matt Ruff's latest novel, The Mirage , one of the most daring 9/11-inspired novels to emerge after that horrific day - The Seattle Times "Ruff embraces his twisty concept with an attention to detail that suggests many months, more likely years, of fervent research. Ruff has never been afraid of temporary immersion in disparate genres, bouncing between sci-fi, literary parody, and even romance from novel to novel and, at times, chapter to chapter. He is a world-class world builder who, perhaps better than any other writer, can create exotic, mysterious worlds and communicate their unique rules and consistent logics both clearly and concisely. The Mirage isn't just an object lesson in geopolitics; it's a secret history, a magic mirror allowing glimpses into the effects of religious fundamentalism of all types on the United States over the last 50 years. Ruff writes with the explosive prose of a very good thriller." - The Stranger " The Mirage is an intriguing addition to the genre . Ruff spices up his tale with a wealth of arresting details. Ruff keeps you reading, [out of] eagerness to see what twist he'll think of next.
" - The New York Times Book Review.