Instruction Manual for Swallowing (Backlit)
Adam Marek
Paperback
List Price:
14.95*
* Individual store prices may vary.
Other Editions of This Title:
Mass Market (12/1/2008)
Description
An engaging new voice in absurdist fiction A new North American edition of an acclaimed short story collection, Instruction Manual for Swallowing explores what happens when ordinary people collide with bizarre, fantastical situations. A man discovers he has testicular cancer on the day that a Godzilla-like monster attacks the city he lives in; a kitchen-hand is put under terrible peer pressure in a restaurant for zombies; a husband and wife discover they are pregnant with 37 babies; and a man travels into the engine room of his own body to discover Busta Rhymes at the controls. The 14 stories are grotesque, hilarious, unnerving, and moving. No matter how outrageous the subject matter of the stories, they have at their heart genuine human experiences that are common to us all. Bonus BackLit materials will include two new stories and an interview with the author.
Praise For Instruction Manual for Swallowing (Backlit)…
"…genuine, unsettling talent." —The Independent
"…a transgressive thrill...delightful." —The Guardian
"Adam Marek writes tales of the fantastic, the grotesque, and the impossible all set in familiar, even mundane worlds. The effect may be unnerving or moving or hilarious, but always there is the gripping sense of an idea gestating to a point just short of revelation. Underpinning Marek's fantasies there is a nagging psychological realism. In this debut collection, the English short story receives an injection of something new and compelling and spooky." Alex Linklater, founder of the National Short Story Prize
"Marek's fabulously meaty, funny writing makes the short story look really exciting again, pulling you, frame by frame, into a bright, strange future." Maggie Gee
ECW Press, 9781770410800, 260pp.
Publication Date: April 1, 2012
About the Author
Adam Marek's prize-winning stories have appeared in many anthologies and magazines. He won the 2011 Arts Foundation Short Story Fellowship and was shortlisted for the inaugural Sunday Times EFG Private Bank Short Story Award. This story collection was nominated for the Frank O'Connor Prize. Visit him online at AdamMarek.co.uk.
