Harper & Row, hardcover
Penguin, paperback (Contemporary American Fiction series)
West Germany: Zsolnay Verlag, hardcover; Grummann Verlag, paperback
Editors' Choice Book: the New York Times and Washington Post

Read an excerpt from Jadis

REVIEWS
New York Times: "A breezy, often hilarious novel... Ken Chowder's charm as a storyteller and his unfailing ability to create realized events are substantial assets."

The New Yorker: "A very good novel... a story about the past's persistence."

Washington Post: "Chowder has the extraordinary ability to find beauty in the everyday mess of love relationships. He turns simple pleasures into comic cantatas."

Kirkus Reviews: "Exuberant riches of style -- reckless leaps in tone, optimistic humor, sheen and generosity... this unusual novel emerges as a canny blend of gravity and sweetness, as it very touchingly addresses the mistakes of love and the impossibility of any final answers." (Starred review)

Margaret Atwood: "Ken Chowder's JADIS is a delightfully eccentric, exquisitely-written tragicomedy of modern manners."

Portland Oregonian: "Brilliant use of language... good writing. Chowder writes for serious readers, but reading him seriously forces them to laugh at the subtle humor he so masterfully conveys."

Booklist: "A wonderfully poetic novel."

Philadelphia Inquirer: "In the hands of a lesser and grimmer novelist, JADIS would demonstrate that the real world dominates... Chowder, however, allows fantasy, virtue, and childhood to triumph; that people never recover from childhood is one of the consolations of being human."

Los Angeles Times: "The triad of characters is complex, funny, and moving in Ken Chowder's third novel."

Boston Globe: "Chowder tells the story beautifully, with a sweet sensibility and shimmering sensual imagery, entertaining us well while touching us deeply."

Milwaukee Journal: "Ken Chowder. Remember the name. JADIS. Remember the book. Remember them both because one belongs to an author whose work should be on every bookshelf and the other is the novel that could put him there. Chowder transcends the given and levitates somewhere above, an example of the truly gifted."