Colette Jones has had problems of her own with alcohol, but now it seems as though her whole family is in danger of turning to booze. Her oldest son, Janus, the family's golden boy, has wasted his talents as a concert pianist. His drinking sprees with his brother-in-law, Bill, a pseudo-Marxist supermarket butcher who sees alcohol as central to the proletarian revolution, have turned violent and landed him in trouble with the police. Meanwhile Colette's recently widowed older brother is desperate to numb his grief. This is a darkly funny novel about a quirky, troubled family as it lurches from farce to tragedy to pub and back again.

"The narrative is mind-bogglingly crisp, resourceful and sometimes hilarious in its description of the myriad ways in which people drink. . . . This is both a moral and a literary book. . . . Remarkable."--London Sunday Times "Far above the ordinary. Woodward's characters are wonderfully complex and rich."--London Telegraph

Author: Gerard Woodward
Binding Type: Paperback
Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company
Published: 09/01/2005
Pages: 446
Weight: 0.91lbs
Size: 8.27h x 5.54w x 1.13d
ISBN: 9780393328004


Review Citation(s):
Publishers Weekly 07/25/2005 pg. 44
Kirkus Reviews 08/01/2005 pg. 815
Ingram Advance 09/01/2005 pg. 66

About the Author
Woodward, Gerard: - Gerard Woodward is the author of the Booker Prize finalist I'll Go to Bed at Noon and A Curious Earth. He was born in London in 1961, and published several prize-winning collections of poetry before turning to fiction. He is a professor of Creative Writing at Bath Spa University and lives in Bath, England.