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Novelist Gary Shteyngart admits he has no hope for the future and has an unfortunate sense of humor (but he's still very funny).

Our first book club pick of 2012 is Gary Shteyngart’s novel, Absurdistan. It tells the story of Misha Vainberg, a young Russian immigrant whose hopes of a U.S. visa are dashed by his father. Forced to leave New York, Misha moves to Absurdistan, a tiny, oil-rich nation where he finds, among other things, civil war, corruption, and love. Get your copy today and start reading this slapstick satire, which the New York Times named one of the 10 best books of 2006!

Share your thoughts and questions about the book, and tune in on January 10, when Gary Shteyngart will be here to discuss Absurdistan.

The sickening ups and downs of the debt ceiling crisis are feeding worries that American politics and the economy are unraveling. For the novelist Gary Shteyngart, it all sounds very familiar: “I’ll turn on the news, I’ll vomit from nervousness and then I’ll wipe my chin and say ‘Oh, you know ...

Gary Shteyngart set his new novel, Super Sad True Love Story, in a dystopian, not-too-distant future where books are passé and social media reigns supreme — just like the present, only worse. Shteyngart tells Kurt how the reality of America's decline ended up outpacing his fiction ...

Gary Shteyngart has been at the top of the New York Times bestseller list, is one of Granta’s Best Young American Novelists, and was just recently selected for the New Yorker’s “20 under 40” list. We talk with him about his new book, “Super Sad True Love Story.”

Find out about some of Gary Shteyngart's favorite picks after appearing on The Leonard Lopate Show.

Gary Shteyngart talks about his new novel, Super Sad True Love Story. Set in New York in the near future, when a functionally illiterate America is on the verge of collapse, it tells the story of Lenny Abramov. Lenny loves books, despite the fact that nobody reads anymore, and printed books are viewed as artifacts of a lost world.

Novels about "the immigrant experience" are usually sentimental tales of pluck and dignity. Gary Shteyngart's Absurdistan is not one of those novels. The hero of the book is a 300 pound Russian named Misha Vainberg who boasts that he has a huge fancy loft apartment in Manhattan ...

Novels about "the immigrant experience" are usually sentimental tales of pluck and dignity. Gary Shteygart's Absurdistan is not one of those novels. The hero of the book is a 300 pound Russian named Misha Vainberg who boasts that he has huge loft apartment in Manhattan and a ...