Reader Score
61%
61% of readers
recommend this book
An unemployed B-unit cameraman, Gunt accepts his ex-wife's offer to shoot a Survivor-style reality show on an obscure island in the Pacific. Somehow, Gunt suffers multiple comas and unjust imprisonment, and is forced to reenact the "Angry Dance" from the movie Billy Elliott, among other tribulations and humiliations. Could the universe be trying to tell him something?
"It is hard to describe, out of context, quite how funny Coupland's novel can be. A lot of its humour springs from the relentless hideousness of Gunt. And yet, increasingly, it is the very fact that Gunt-- in Voltairean fashion--is the only character in Coupland's menagerie who can see the awfulness of the human apocalypse around him that makes the book so compelling. Coupland's eye for the strange, mesmerising wonder of modernity is being put, more than ever, to extremely dark use here. The fact that it is all so demented--and so frequently, belly-achingly hilarious--only makes that darkness all the more impressive."--The Sunday Times
"Provocative and entertaining."--The Daily Mail
"Riotous, frequently very funny."--The Independent
"Filthy and funny."--TimeOut London
"Clever bits of observational humour ... his best book in recent years."--The Toronto Star
"An entry--a fun one--in a personal, pop-cult canon of its own."--Toronto Globe and Mail
"[Raymond Gunt] is a fabulous monster, with nothing and no one safe from his vitriol. Raymond torments the obese, faces multiple incarcerations, makes leering advances at every woman crossing his path, and plays a role in a potentially globe-threatening nuclear event... Coupland skewers a pop world's growing insensibilities, and his protagonist is a charming villain whom readers will likely root for, even as he's insulting them."--Publisher's Weekly (starred)
"Engaging, funny and a rocking good read...Readers will identify with Ray Gunt in spite of themselves, taking pleasure in his crazy antics."--BookPage