Mission to America

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Mission to America
Author	Walter Kirn
Country	United States
Language	English
Genre(s)	Satirical novel
Publisher	Doubleday
Publication date	11 October 2005
Media type	Print (Hardback & Paperback)
Pages	271 pp (first edition, hardback)
ISBN	ISBN 038550764X (first edition, hardback)

Mission to America is a novel by American novelist Walter Kirn.

The novel is narrated by Mason LaVerle, a member of a tiny religious sect in rural Bluff, Montana, called the Aboriginal Fulfilled Apostles, whose complicated views involve a kind of highly incorporative theology and a strict dietary regimen that facilitates healthy gastrointestinal activity. Concerned about the AFAs' dwindling numbers and attempting to capitalize on a recent spate of unexpected national attention, LaVerle and a partner, Elder Stark, set out on a mission to bring converts to the faith. Neither has been outside of Bluff before, and the pair quickly find themselves fending off the onslaught of corrupting influences they encounter in modern America, most prominently junk food and sex. After a series of misadventures, the duo ends up in Snowshoe, Colorado, a ski resort populated by a horrifying cast of the decadent rich and their hangers-on, where LaVerle finds romance with a former internet nude model and Stark becomes a toadying guru for an eccentric billionaire. As Stark gets sucked into the orbit of this bizarre community, LaVerle fights to save him and his dying faith, while battling his own temptations.

Kirn distributes his biting satire generously, skewering both the perversities of Snowshoe's soulless elite and the gullibility and opportunism of the erstwhile missionaries. His portrait of wealth and faith in a hyperventilating American West is often hilarious, and while Kirn is clearly indulging a deeply cynical strain, the book can turn disturbing as each new observation of some modern monstrosity, made through the innocent eyes of Mason, rings true.