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The Ticking Heart
"Expansive and imaginative." --Kirkus Reviews
"Irreverent and bursting prose... Fans of Mark Leyner will enjoy Kaufman's messy string of outrageous scenarios." --Publishers Weekly
Part modern fable, part detective novel, a journey through grief in the imaginary world of Metaphoria.
One cold winter night, Charlie shares a cab with a stranger in a purple hat. As they talk, a cloud of purple smoke overwhelms him and he wakes up to find himself behind the only desk in the Epiphany Detective Agency. Charlie, as it turns out, is trapped in Metaphoria, an otherworldly place that reality has forgotten, a place where everything means something else. His first client is Shirley Miller, who insists on hiring Charlie to find her husband's missing heart. In fact, she's so insistent that she replaces Charlie's heart with a bomb. He has twenty-four hours to find Twiggy Miller's heart - and its meaning - or his own will explode.
Tender and brutal, optimistic and despairing, this modern fable by the author of the cult hit All My Friends Are Superheroes takes a fresh look at what it means to fall into, and out of, love.
Book Details
- Publisher: Coach House Books
- Publish Date: Sep 17th, 2019
- Pages: 176
- Language: English
- Edition: undefined - undefined
- Dimensions: 7.50in - 5.00in - 0.60in - 0.50lb
- EAN: 9781552453896
- Categories: • Literary• Magical Realism• Absurdist
About the Author
Andrew Kaufman was born in Wingham, Ontario, making him the second-most-famous Canadian writer to come from Wingham (after Alice Munro, of course). He is the author of international bestseller All My Friends are Superheroes, The Waterproof Bible, ReLit Award-winner The Tiny Wife, and Born Weird, which was named a Best Book of the Year by The Globe and Mail and was shortlisted for the Leacock award for humor. He lives and writes in Toronto.
More books by Andrew Kaufman
Praise for this book
"Tom is not a superhero. But he is friends with a lot of them and even married one, The Perfectionist. But on his wedding day, his wife is hypnotised by another superhero and can no longer see Tom. When she is sure he has left her, she gets on a plane to start a new life and Tom has the duration of the flight to convince her he is still there. Yes, an odd premise, but Kaufman's book is so funny, very strange and quite romantic. All My Friends are Superheroes is a sweet and touching novella, packed full of more truthful observations about love and humans than most full-sized novels achieve." -- The Guardian "Top 10 books to read now you've finished The Fault in Our Stars"
"An imaginative tale of an ordinary man surrounded by unusual superheroes, on a quest to win back the love of his life. With its unique premise and quirky cast of characters (including the Perfectionist, the Ear, the Spooner and the Impossible Man), you'll speed through this adorable book in an afternoon." -- Cosmopolitan, "13 non-cringy books about love to add to your reading list"
"Somebody should write Mr Kaufman and thank him for his tender heart. I expect this story will replace boxes of chocolates and flowers in courting rituals to come." -- Sheila Heti
"I loved every word of it." -- Seth Godin
"An adorable book." -- Toby Litt
"This lovely novella is, at heart, a simple tale of boy meets girl. Boy (Tom, normal) meets girl (The Perfectionist, superhero). Boy falls for girl. Boy gets girl. At their wedding, girl's ex-boyfriend (Hypno, superhero) convinces girl that boy doesn't exist. Boy, now invisible to girl, must win her back. I love this book and all of its light-hearted, matter-of-fact prose about things that should seem completely absurd, but somehow don't. I hope you do, too." -- Kari Patch, Harvard Bookstore
"Buy it, borrow it, steal it but just make sure you read it ... Genius ... I read it on the train home the day I received it and spent the whole evening smiling." -- Scott Pack, former Head Buyer, Waterstones
"The funniest, quirkiest romance of the year." -- Marie Phillips, author of Gods Behaving Badly
"The modern day Lewis Carroll" -- BookD Podcast (91,000 subscribers)