“A smart, darkly funny, relevant novel about what is lurking behind the kitchen door. Pickett takes our most basic needs—food, love, family, and community—and reimagines them until the paradoxes of sustenance are seen anew. A wonderful debut.”—Jill Ciment, author of The Body in Question
“In his brisk and lively debut Alex Pickett flits from one delightfully imperfect character to another with remarkable assurance, exceptional skill, and extravagant imagination. The result is an engrossing and captivating panorama of a small town in turmoil. As vivid and odd as real life, but with a better plot.”—Chris Bachelder, author of The Throwback Special
“I love Alex Pickett’s writing. Hilarious and heartbreaking, his debut novel The Restaurant Inspector plays like the lost Coen Brothers movie of my dreams — an absurd yet authentic depiction of Middle America that grounds you in the banal normality of the region while subtly pointing out the myriad ways in which people are slowly losing their minds.” —Steven Hyden, author of This Isn’t Happening and Twilight Of The Gods