The Plumber of Souls

Michael Guinzburg. Carroll & Graf Publishers, $14 (256pp) ISBN 978-0-7867-1323-3

A sort of ""human enema"" who ""flush[es] the waste from the system,"" the titular protagonist of Michael Guinzburg's The Plumber of Souls is an enforcer for the Catholic Church, plying his trade in a darkly funny world of grotesque transgressions. Traveling the globe, he picks off scourged souls-pedophiliac priests, rapacious software billionaires and the sewer-lurking Merdistes, who seek the one true turd. Guinzburg's fast and playful wit whisks the reader along on an absurdist joyride. .

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