Don't be intimidated by the opening chapters of David Duchovny's new novel. I wondered a bit where he wants to lead us, there are multiple literary and cultural references which are actually quite heavy, especially for me who English isn’t my native language, where the author shows he made good use of his Princeton and Yales’ education. I struggled to really fit into the novel, but over the chapters, I got carried away by the story of this ex-stuntman turned Mormon, who retreats into the Joshua Tree wilderness with his wives and many children, and who is confronted in spite of himself with the new realities of the world.

The critic is broadly present, often with humor, which characterizes the author's prose, and the topics covered are numerous: consumerism, junk food, social media, and politics. He also mentions a problem close to his heart, ecology. The author mentioned in a recent interview that he felt close to the characters he had played, because most of them were transgressive: there is a subject in this novel that may confuse some readers.

The characters aren’t necessarily endearing at first glance, even if most of them are well drawn, but we start turning the pages to know their fate, and the strength of the novel is precisely there, in a growing intensity and an almost cinematographic writing (the novel could be adapted for television).
It’s a powerful, exciting and thoughtful novel.

Truly Like Lightning by David Duchovny is published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux, its release date is February 2, 2021.
Thanks to FSG books for a copy of this novel in exchange for an honest review.

This is the first of David Duchovny's books I've read but it definitely will not be the last. Although better known as an intuitive, charismatic actor, his bio proves that he is a renaissance man with talents that range from his acting gigs to music and here he proves himself a writer of originality. He has always been known for intellectual curiosity and prowess, having garnered his degrees at both Princeton and Yale with honors. He credits inspiration for this lengthy but totally involving novel to Prof. Harold Bloom and his study of Joseph Smith.

So here we have a former stuntman turned Mormon leader who lives with his wives and children in the desert near San Bernardino, completely off the grid and living the laws of the faith. Enter the outside world via Maya Abbadessa, a young Turk employee of a predatory real estate company, who crashes literally into their compound, stoned but observant. What happens unfolds through the eyes of multiple characters, all accurately developed and completely involving. Highly recommended.

Maya Abbadessa is trying to hold her own at Praetorian Capital, the Santa Monica company run by self-made billionaire Robert Malouf. While Malouf has holdings in many ventures, real estate is the primary asset. The workplace has been tough for Maya, the only woman among a frat-like brotherhood of thirty-somethings. She knows she has to score a huge listing to earn the respect of Malouf and her co-workers. The opportunity comes on a weekend where the employees travel to Joshua Tree to trip acid and spitball some interesting business ideas.
High as a kite, Maya drives out into the desert in a car she’s never been in before and stumbles upon the Powers family where she’s promptly shot with an arrow.

Bronson Powers was once a celebrated Hollywood stuntman but for the past twenty years he has lived deep in Joshua Tree on land that he inherited with his three wives and ten children, following Mormon teachings. The family has been successful at remaining oblivious to the modern world but their way of life is threatened when Maya finds them.
Aware of the astronomical value of the land, Maya strikes a deal with the Powers family. If they enroll three of their children in public school and Maya can prove they’re better off there than in the desert, Bronson will sell a plot of his land to Maya.

The three oldest children, already exceptionally bright, assimilate to the modern world with ease but not without complication as their way of life is put under the microscope and their views on religion, family, sex, and race are challenged in dangerous ways.

Truly Like Lightning is a complicated read. The plot required more suspension of disbelief than I care for and the points of view jump around often which means I never got to know anyone very well. I found it hard to believe these kids who have been sheltered from the world their entire lives transitioned so quickly into the real world. Not enough time was spent developing the character of Bronson Powers. Readers have insight into his past but his actions at the end of the book left me scratching my head because the climax felt like it came out of left field. The wives are given backstory but they felt more like props.
Despite all of that, I still felt compelled to keep reading! Duchovny is a gifted storyteller and his quirky sense of humor made this worth the read. Several characters are well crafted with authentic flaws and my feelings about each of them fluctuated with the story arc.

Thanks to Farrar, Straus, and Giroux and NetGalley for providing me with an ARC in exchange for my honest review. Truly Like Lightning is scheduled for release on February 2, 2021.

A great actor proves he is also a great author. i raved about his Miss Subway for the Boston Globe years ago, and this new book is just as original and wild.

I could not finish this book. Throughout I was asking myself "WTF did I just read?". I was asked to review this book and I agreed because it sounded interesting and the author's name seemed familiar. I later realized he's the guy from X-files, of which I was not a fan but that has no bearing here other than I will not simply give this a good review because I am/was a fan.

From the first chapter I thought of putting this down as it starts with Bronson, an ex-stuntman who found religion in the Mormon church, with his own slant, in order to inherit a huge plot of land outside of Joshua Tree (I am a fan of the park and admit that piece kept me reading in itself). It felt like a diatribe on religion, not being religious it didn't bother me other than it's not my thing and I could not tell where it was going. The second chapter we meet Maya a money-hungry capitalist who wants to steal Bronson's land away from him to create a huge real estate development. It wasn't until almost a quarter of the way through the book that I had any idea what the point was.

Duchovny has strung together numerous complaints about society from the Liberal's handbook. I too consider myself liberal but it was too much and felt more like reading Twitter with a tenuous storyline to connect all the comments. If you are a Trump fan, which I certainly am not, you will really hate this book. There are several anti-Trump rants in just the first half (I didn't read much past that) and I've seen Trump supporters give scathing reviews for novels that include even one line against him. But even for me it was too much especially when a character who has been living in the desert for years with no outside contact is forced back into society and learns about Trump and he is now one of the things that keeps her up at night. She watches YouTube videos of Obama and wishes she had been aware of him when he was president. Two months before she didn't even know what a smart phone was. This book will not age well. Even now that the election is over and I'm just waiting until Inauguration Day I don't want to read all this. The final straw for me was pages of a side story about the ills of immigration in this country. As someone that used to work in immigration law, Duchovny's take was all too simplified and one-sided and all the blame laid at the feet of Trump when there's been issues long before him, he was just the first president since the Japanese concentration camps to treat immigrants as inhuman.

All in all I think there is a good story buried in there somewhere if you stripped away most of the unnecessary political rants and put the effort into character development. They all just felt flat and cartoonish in their role to further Duchovny's agenda.

Thank you to Farrar, Straus and Giroux and #Netgalley publishing for allowing me to review this book.

Full disclosure: I’m an X-Files fan. That’s where I discovered David Duchovny & I’ve been a fan since circa 1994. As a fan of his acting, I was a bit skeptical when I heard he was publishing his first book, Holy Cow, in 2015. My initial reaction was *oh no David, what are you doing? You’re an actor, stay in your lane!* But that’s not really fair is it? Creatively gifted, artistic people can crossover successfully, right? And it’s not like David Duchovny the author came out of nowhere. He was close to getting his PhD from in English Literature from Yale when he left to pursue “the business of show.” So put aside any derision or skepticism you might feel when an actor does something different, forget Mulder and Moody, and read his books with an open mind.

Ok, that was my preface, now onto his 4th & latest novel: Truly Like Lightning. It’s the story of a plural marriage family led into the wilderness by Bronson Powers. I think there’s something universally appealing & romantic about living off the grid & sheltered from much of the world. I live in Ohio, and whenever I see an Amish person I think *maybe I should give the middle finger to this rat race and become Amish? Seems hard, yet simple and pure. Plus, I’ve always liked horses.* But in reality I know it’s not that simple to drop out of the modern world & live happily ever after. The Powers family soon discovers this, too. After meeting the Powers family, we meet Maya; young, educated, struggling to find her place working for a millionaire who shares a lot of characteristics with a certain real estate developer turned politician. David does a great job of painting a mental picture of her boss, Malouf, and if you’re a fan of Trump’s style of “leadership” you might not enjoy this aspect of the book. Maya stumbles upon the Powers family one night in the desert, sees an opportunity to advance her career, and sets in motion a chain of events that don’t end well for everyone.

If you’re a member of the LDS church, which I’m not, will you be offended by this book? Maybe. Plural marriage is controversial. It’s not exclusively a fringe Mormon practice, but Bronson’s unlikely conversion to Mormonism is where he gets the notion to marry three women. Bronson inherits the land from an LDS aunt on the condition he converts. He does, but then he immediately breaks away from the church to practice his version of the faith on his isolated land. His wives are not forced into plural marriage. David never passes moral judgment on the practice or pretends to be an expert on early Mormon beliefs. I wasn’t reading this story & thinking *huh, so that’s what Mormonism is like?* It’s fiction, but parts of the book had me stopping to read up Mormon history. Every religion has fringe groups that take off on strange tangents. To me, it’s just a fascinating story about one person’s religious fervor that affects everyone around him. I’d love to find a review from a member of the LDS who has read this book to get the opinion of someone who knows more about Mormon history. Bronson having multiple wives isn’t even the most shocking part of the story to me. There’s a small incident early in the book that might offend some, I had to read the section twice to make sure I’d really read what I just read.

Without giving away too much of the plot (maybe I have already?) the last section was my favorite. Part one introduces us to the respective worlds of Bronson & Maya, and tells us how their worlds collide. Part two, we get to know some of his family better, and how they each deal with their unexpected situation in different ways was interesting. The last act, part three, is very fast paced. I could almost see how it was going to end, but not exactly. There isn’t really a happy ending for anyone, but life isn’t a fairy tale & I found the afterward hopeful in spite of everything that transpired to get the characters where they are in the end.

This wasn’t my favorite plot of David’s four books, I loved Miss Subways for it’s combination of magic & realism because I gravitate towards fantasy, science fiction and horror writing. But that’s just my taste in stories. It’s undeniable that he’s grown as a writer with each novel. All his writing does a wonderful job conveying the complexity of human nature. Even Holy Cow, where the main characters are animals but they’re still relatable. People are not “good or evil,” we just are. What matters in Truly Like Lightning is how we emerge after going through the refining fires of life.

Branson Powers is the patriarch of a Mormon family in the middle of the desert. He rules the family as a circus strongman type, like Putin or Trump. Like Trump, he has an eccentric collection of wives and children.
One day, civilization arrives on his land by accident. The stage is set for a culture clash novel. Will Bronson's exceptionalism prevail over the greedy developers? Read this entertaining and picaresque story to find out.

Truly Like Lightning will gain a following if potential purchasers observe its pros and cons to determine whether this is their cup of tea.

Pros: A true insider's view of Hollywood types including stuntmen and behind-the-scenes catalysts. (The view of mankind appears to be tempered by that insider knowledge. Not surprising.) A clearly inquisitive and knowledgeable mind has gone to great lengths to not only research the Mormon faith but demonstrate how belief systems are, ahem, reinterpreted to fit an individual's desired existential experience. Moments of cerebral absorption for the reader, as might be expected from the pen of an inquisitive and knowledgeable mind.

Cons: The view of mankind may appear to be singularly jaundiced. For some readers, the lack of appealing characters may be daunting. I was interested in Bronson until I came to the moment in the book when his choice with his daughter, and the seeming acquiescence of all involved including the daughter, simply lost my interest. Subsequent reflection made me realize that the female characters, though delivered in a modern (almost politically correct) form, still serve the interests of the male protagonist. I could not find a character to like and that was it for me.

I'm not sure what I expected from this, since I earnestly chose to read this because I didn't know David Duchovny wrote novels. This was great! I definitely want to read more of his work.

Dave Duchovny has written another novel that drew me right in.A book that is layered with characters that come alive that enveloped me in their world their lives.Highly recommend.#netgalley#fsg

David Duchovny’s fourth novel, Truly Like Lightning, is an emotional tale of a family at the crossroads.

Bronson Powers, an aging Hollywood stuntman with a growing drug addiction, inherits from his grandmother, a vast amount of uninhabited desert land near Joshua Tree. The only stipulation, Bronson must convert to Mormonism and be approved by the Elders before the land becomes his.

Bronson researches and absorbs everything he can about the founder, Joseph Smith. He adopts the Mormon way of life and models his life after the mandates of Smith, some in direct conflict with today’s Mormon Church. Bronson’s faith gives his life meaning and his religion gives him structure and order and he believes he is a better person because of it.

For the last twenty years, Bronson and his three wives and ten children live a sheltered life, away from the temptations of the modern world. Bronson, along with the sister wives, homeschool the children. The children seem to be thriving and the family unit is strong. Theirs is a world without - caffeine, alcohol, drugs, tv, or computers.

Then, in stumbles Maya, a young, ambitious, real estate developer. She realizes the land’s potential and plots to steal it away from Bronson. She lies and schemes and offers the Powers’ a deal – send three of your children to school in town. After a year, if they do better in town school than in homeschool, then the family must agree to sell her a portion of their land.

Can they be in the world, but not of it?

The children become strangers in a foreign land. The family structure crumbles and relationships become strained. Bronson contemplates his faith and desperately tries to hang on. Even Maya battles with her conscience.

Duchovny has managed to breathe life into every one of his characters. You empathize with them; become attached to them and care about them. His tale is as rich in humor as it is in darkness. The story comes at you fast and furious and is unpredictable. It is full and rich and is bound to be a bestseller. It leaves you thinking about it long after the last word is read. This belongs on the big screen.

The book is published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux and will be available February 2, 2021. Preorder yours today.

Truly Like Lightning is a joy to read. This novel spans the life of Bronson Powers, from his childhood to his career as a Hollywood stuntman to his inheritance of spacious acreage in the desert, in return for him assuming the Morman faith.
What is especially so wonderful about this book is the author, David Duchovny’s skill in blending humor with troubling events, all told in elevated vocabulary.
Besides Bronson, there is an octet of riveting characters, each having complex inner essences. The lives of these people have been challenged by a situation that disrupts their everyday lives and tests their reserve.
There is neutrality in the unbiased description of each character, giving the reader a chance to form their own opinion about these people’s actions.
My interest was held throughout due to great storytelling and surprising consequences.
I have enjoyed other works by this author tremendously, but in my opinion, Truly Like Lightning is David Duchovny’s masterpiece.

I requested this book based on plot alone — a true unicorn of a story. What I didn’t expect was to be blown over by the breadth and complexity Duchovny delivered.

Truly Like Lightening is as much a meaty digestive as a ready-for-film thriller. Duchovny’s characters are equally lovable and flawed. I was completely gripped by this work of moral confrontation and internal contemplation.

David Duchovny strikes again and delivers a truly epic tale! I wasn't sure what to expect with this book and the plot being mainly about Mormons, but being a fan of his other 3 books I just went in trusting him to keep me entertained. I'm really glad that I did. I was afraid of not being able to get into the story but it is so well told and all of the characters have such a distinct voice that it's easy to get wrapped up in their tale and just enjoy the rollercoaster ride of emotions that you go through with them. Each character is so different and yet they all make up one perfect whole. I laughed a lot, enjoyed all of the pop culture references, and had a deep love and understanding for most of the main characters. I could definitely relate to a few of the characters myself and felt right at home with a lot of their personalities. This story is completely different from his other 3 but has quickly become my favorite one. I loved his real world take on the events in the story and how nothing is really what you expect or guess them to be. This story is begging to be told on the big screen. Do yourself a favor and preorder this book so you can read it ASAP!

Proving once more than he has literary chops, David Duchovny weaves an intriguing story of place and people.

Lest we forget that Duchovny is a student of storytelling, the authors demonstrates this mastery with another layered story, populated with believable characters and enough conflict to keep the pages turning.

In TRULY LIKE LIGHTNING, by David Duchovny, we meet Bronson Powers, a former talented stuntman who has adopted the Mormon way of life, but with his own special take on the Mormon lifestyle. He adopts many of the Joseph Smith edicts on how to live (even some since abandoned by the Mormon church) including polygamy and moves his three wives and 10 kids out to the a large plot of land in the area of Joshua Tree in California. When an outsider stumbles upon their hidden existence, she sees dollar signs and quickly hatches a plan to acquire Powers' land. In the end, that plan will change the Powers family forever in ways no one involved could have ever predicted.
Duchovny creates quite a character in Bronson Powers. Bronson is charismatic, strong-willed, and resourceful, and the reader sees in the beginning of the book that he became who he is by identifying his faults and finding a lifestyle the helps him cope with himself and the world around him and he believes makes him a better person. All the people that are important to the book are well crafted as well, from Bronson's kids, to a strange and powerful real estate developer that is attempting to take the Powers' land, to Bronson's wives, who are fascinating individuals that the reader can't help but attach to and have sympathy for as much as any other person in the book. Duchovny creates a problem for the Powers family, and how the results unfold are logical and realistic, while at the same time excitingly unpredictable.
TRULY LIKE LIGHTNING will stay with you long after you finish reading and forces the reader to consider how society perceives bigotry, acceptance, tolerance, and how tightly people hold to their own belief system.

Truly Like Lightning is an epic American novel, set firmly in the here and now, but reaching back to past generations and pushing forward into the future. It follows a large cast of characters, each with unique and fully developed backgrounds and motivations. These characters are dynamic and interesting, their paths and finish lines are surprising and yet absolutely true to them.

One thing I truly appreciate is the way the main characters are presented, for the most part, without mockery or derision. There’s no judgment of their lives, this is just who they are. It takes a lot of talent to put forward such an extreme story as if it just IS, and the author has accomplished that. This perspective helps the reader find commonality with the characters, who may have had very different experiences. Even though their lives aren’t run-of-the-mill, their emotions and reactions are in many ways universal.

The novel is not so neutral about society at large. It calls into question the cost of “progress”, particularly in the past 20 years. The criticism is harsh yet presented with a deft use of humor, focusing on shared reality rather than blame. It was this humor in which I recognized the author’s voice most clearly.

I’m a huge fan of Mr. Duchovny’s earlier novels. I enjoyed the almost light, almost fantastical storytelling, even where darker themes were explored. This novel is a step above. It draws you in with crisp, clear prose, an intensely fast pace, a compelling, multi-faceted story, and characters who break your heart in the best way. I’d say I couldn’t put it down, except that I had to stop every few pages just to catch my breath. True to form, the author leaves us with a fairy tale ending, albeit slightly more grounded in reality. It’s stunningly brilliant.

Review of Truly Like Lightning :

This 4th novel by David Duchovny is truly like lightning, and it has struck me down, and blew my mind from beginning to end. It took me just 3 days to finish this book, unable to put it down.
I've read It almost non stop, so caught up was I in this fascinating, intriguing world created by David Duchovny. The world of the Powers family, led by Bronson Powers with his 3 wives and 10 children.
The Powers family is like a little community, isolated from the modern world, living in desert land owned by Bronson. Their blended family is organized, peaceful and governed by the laws of their Mormon god. Basically they are independent, self reliant, resourceful and free. All of that would change when a young real estate developer agent, Maya Abbadessa discovered their existence by accident. She saw rich potentials from the Powerses land and offered to buy it. When Bronson refused she offered threats, then a wager. Their decision to take this bet escalated to a chain of deadly events, crime, loss and regrets.

I highly recommend this book. It is powerful, thoughtful and exciting. So well written with David Duchovny's dry wit and sense of humor evident. It is character and plot driven. A story about innocence and guilt, freedom and discipline, spirituality and corruption, capitalism and Love. This book is a masterpiece.

At the end, I found myself in tears, so overwhelmed was I emotionally on how beautiful is Truly Like Lightning.

David Duchovny’s fourth novel is about the conflict of values and faith in the 21st century.  The Powers family has been “homesteading” in the desert near Joshua Tree.  The family lives an isolated and challenging lifestyle of commitment to their faith, to their land and to each other. Modern society encroaches in the way of a land developer who accidently stumbles upon their land.  The land developer is motivated by greed and ambition but brings with her a social value bias regarding people who live outside the mainstream and educate their children at home.  
Duchovny aptly sets up the romanticized motif of both the American West and the Hollywood West in the character of family patriarch, Bronson Powers, who is a former Hollywood stuntman turned religious convert and, now, cowboy.  Bronson embodies the traits of individualism and ingenuity which are mythological as part of the American pioneering character.  The novel places that character and romanticized motif in direct conflict with the 21st century America of today.  
The plot is action packed.  Do not start section three until you have time to finish the section!  You will not want to put it down.  The characters are both mythic and realistic.  There are many of them.  Just in the Powers family alone there are three wives and ten children.  They are each individually drawn as complete characters. The foreshadowing in the book is on point, but the direction of each foreshadowed element takes the reader by surprise.  
The book is described as a “heartbreaking meditation on family, religion, sex, greed, human nature and the vanishing environment of an ancient desert.”   It is, also a meditation  about conflict in the American spirit.  Where do we draw the line of the individualism we so value?  Will we protect the land we love or exploit it in gross disregard for the science of global warming?  What is the role of religion in our individual lives and our cultural consciousness?    Do we value diversity or are we becoming more and more entrenched into an us and them paradigm?  Even the question of public education vs home schooling is meditated upon in this novel.
Readers of Duchovny’s other novels will notice a divergence in style and tone.  His other three novels included large portions of stream of consciousness style. This novel has more of a traditional omnipresent narration which allows for more character reveals in dramatic moments.  It, also, allows the reader to see the characters externally through other characters’ judgements which is critical for the thematic purposes of this novel.  While all Duchovny’s novels , including this one, deal with serious subjects and include great humor simultaneously, this novel seems more serious because of the lack of  stream of consciousness, short chapters, and humorous chapter titles.  There was a part of me that deeply missed the style of some of Duchovny’s other novels.  However, the seriousness of this novel seems appropriate with the thematic nature and “meditation” of the current time.  Even though this book was written before the pandemic and the racial unrest of this summer, the book is representative of the difficult and challenging times this country has faced in the last few years.  
I am a fan of David Duchovny as an author. As much as I love his first three novels, I have stated before that I expected him at some point to have a break through novel which would help people to see him less as an actor who writes than as a legitimate American voice of literature. This novel should do that.  It is one of the most impressive novels I have read in many years.

I will start off by saying this is Duchovny's best work yet. You might think I'm exaggerating just because I have been a fan of his written words for a while now, but the truth is that this book brought me so many different views, so much knowledge, so many feelings, that it is really hard to translate it all into just a few sentences.
Not being an American myself, I was afraid that the cultural differences would weigh heavily on my reading, but that was not the case. If anything, it was like a huge history lesson on things I did not know and also a lesson on how judging others using our own view of the world can be harmful. Wouldn't things be a little bit better if we just knew how to listen?
Eloquently, Duchovny translates his unique sense of humor and political criticism into perfectly crafted dialogues that guide us through this equally unique story about a man who believes too much, a woman that wants the world without really caring about the world, and the people who get tangled up in their stories as a consequence.
Truly Like Lightning is a book that can make you laugh, cry, stay on the edge of your seat, reflect and, most importantly, give you hope that there are better days ahead, despite everything. In short, this book truly is like lightning – it hits us hard when we are least expecting it and it lightens our skies at the same time.