Music for Torching
Published on 5. June 2006
Book
Paperback/Softback
368 pages
978-1-86207-889-5 (ISBN)
Description
Paul and Elaine have two boys and a beautiful home, yet they find themselves thoroughly, inexplicably stuck. Obsessed with 'making things good again', they spin the quiet terrors of family life into a fantastical frenzy that careens well and truly out of control. As A. M. Homes's incendiary novel unfolds, the Kodacolor hues of the American good life become nearly hallucinogenic: from a strange and hilarious encounter on the floor of the pantry with a Stepford-wife neighbour, to a house-cleaning team in space suits, to a hostage situation at the school. Homes lays bare the foundations of marriage and family life, and creates characters outrageously flawed, deeply human and entirely believable.
Reviews / Votes
"* 'Homes doesn't so much critique suburban American life as shoot it, stab it, chuck it in the book of her car and drive it into a lake' The Times * 'Homes opens a window on a world where our neuroses rot in full view' Sunday Herald (Glasgow) * 'The more bizarre things get, the more impressed one is by A.M. Homes's skills as a realist, a portraitist of contemporary life at its most perverse' David Leavitt * 'Exhilarating... a hell-bound joyride of a book' Newsweek * 'There have been very few women writers like Homes' Zadie Smith"More details
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Person
AM Homes is the author of several novels -, The End of Alice, In a Country of Mothers, and Jack - and two collections of short stories, The Safety of Objects and the recent highly acclaimed Things You Should Know all published by Granta. She is a contributing editor to Vanity Fair and teaches in the writing programme at Columbia University. She lives in New York City. Her latest novel, This Book Will Save Your Life is published by Granta this month.