Martyr!

 Martyr! by Kaveh Akbar is one of the most entertaining, profound novels written in the last ten years. I read it eagerly, absorbing the first few humorous chapters and enjoying the transformation as the book shifted into a serious meditation on mortality, sensuality, the power of art, the immigrant experience, and sobriety. The protagonist, Cyrus Shams, is one of the great literary characters: an Iranian-American orphan muddling his way through a quarterlife crisis. He's surrounded by friend support that he takes for granted, and also aided by his subconscious, art, God, and history. It takes him much of the novel to realize this, and to locate a meaning in life, a reason to carry on. Akbar is a poet first, and the writing is unflaggingly pretty, erudite, and honest. 

It becomes clear that the lost meaning is similar to the proverbial "God-shaped hole" in most people's experience. Martyr!'s answer to this is not conventional religion, but something else, a persistent thread in the second half of the book. On a personal level, I think the novel's diagnosis is incorrect. I disagree with Akbar. But Martyr! earns my respect even while presenting a worldview I don't share. It's a brilliantly composed work of art, worthwhile in all sorts of ways--literarily, morally, and aesthetically.