It is a commonplace that literature, particularly the novel, is a venue for examining societal trends, to force readers and members of such societies to confront the difficult problems of their times. And with art, a pursuit that is often mistakenly equated with entertainment, this goal is often a difficult one to achieve without losing the intended audience: to make people look at what is harmful and wretched in themselves, what they would rather ignore, is an extremely arduous task, particularly in the world of art, a place where we often come to "escape" our problems. In The Broom of the System Wallace takes great care to force the reader to countenance the conflicts of late millennial America. The rigor of Wallace's self-imposed effort is compounded when we consider the near-infinite amount of entertaining and stimulating choices available to us in the world of entertainment.

The...