Zoo Time

Reading is over. Writing is finished. Publishing is dead. Embittered author Guy Ableman knows this, as does his desperate editor; as does the sad whole of doomed literary London. But Guy is dedicated to his dying art, and continues to write for an audience that doesn't exist, loathed by the few readers he does have - feminists who charge him with misogyny, mothers who accuse him of hating children. His vivacious wife Vanessa, a strikingly beautiful red-head, contrary, highly strung and often blazingly angry, is another source of pain, as is her alluring mother Poppy. More like sisters than mother and daughter, they come as a pair, a blistering presence. And Guy is, from the off, as captivated by his mother-in-law as he is by his wife... Against a backdrop of disappointment, failure and loss, in a world in which food and fashion have long since trampled fiction into the ground, Guy is consumed with the temptation of an illicit affair. It distorts every thought in his head, and becomes his next great novel. Fantasy blurs with reality in this furious, hilarious novel about love, loss, mothers and daughters. Frank, poignant and moving, Zoo Time is our funniest writer at his brilliant best.

About the Author :
An award-winning writer and broadcaster, Howard Jacobson was born in Manchester, brought up in Prestwich and was educated at Stand Grammar School in Whitefield, and Downing College, Cambridge, where he studied under F. R. Leavis. He lectured for three years at the University of Sydney before returning to teach at Selwyn College, Cambridge. His novels include The Mighty Walzer (winner of the Bollinger Everyman Wodehouse Prize), Kalooki Nights (longlisted for the Man Booker Prize), the highly acclaimed The Act of Love and, mopst recently, the Man Booker Prize-winning, The Finkler Question. Howard Jacobson lives in London.

Review :
'Like all of [Jacobson's] work, The Finkler Question has a kind of energy that you have to look at through your fingers, like an eclipse. As the brightness of his brilliance is hard to look at, so is the darkness of his humor. I don't know a funnier writer alive' Outlandish, fueled by rage, very much like a brilliant comic stand-up routine…a comic novel of ideas. 'How is it possible to read Howard Jacobson and not lose oneself in admiration for the music of his language, the power of his characterisation and the penetration of his insight?' 'On this form, Jacobson has better claims than anyone to be called the greatest novelist working in Britain today' 'Sentence by sentence, there are few writers who exhibit the same unawed respect for language or such a relentless commitment to re-examining even the most seemingly unobjectionable of received wisdoms' Jacobson is a master of stylish prose with a comic bent. Howard Jacobson's prose is hilarious…this literary novel about the death of the literary novel sounds comedy's depths of sorrow. Just because most of us don't fantasize continuously about ditching our wives for our mothers-in-law doesn't mean it's not an excellent premise for a novel. …entertaining - and biting - to the final twist. [A]wickedly funny satire of publishing…It is always a joy to read Jacobson's prose, whose beguilingly casual tone belies its meticulous construction. This newest work confirms yet again his singular ability to weave comedy, sex, ideas, and deep insight into irresistible storytelling.