The Odyssey

Description

From the prize-winning author of Supper Club comes a wickedly funny and slyly poignant new satire on modern life - for fans of My Year of Rest and Relaxation, Convenience Store Woman, and J. G. Ballard's High Rise 'This book is a serious vibe' Cosmopolitan 'Lara Williams is the queen of smart modern satire. I could read her all day' Emma Jane Unsworth Meet Ingrid. She works on a gargantuan luxury cruise liner, where she spends her days reorganizing the merchandise and waiting for long-term guests to drop dead in the changing rooms. On her days off, she disembarks from the ship and gets blind drunk on whatever the local alcohol is. It's not a bad life. And it distracts her from thinking about the other life she left behind five years ago. Until one day she is selected for the employee mentorship scheme - an initiative run by the ship's mysterious captain and self-anointed lifestyle guru, Keith, who pushes Ingrid further than she thought possible. But sooner or later, she will have to ask herself: how far is too far? Utterly original, mischievous and thought-provoking, The Odyssey is a merciless takedown of consumer capitalism and our anxious, ill-fated quests for something to believe in. And as its title suggests, it is a voyage that will eventually lead its unlikely heroine all the way home. Though she'd do almost anything to avoid getting there...

Lara Williams is the author of Treats and Supper Club. Treats was shortlisted for the Republic of Consciousness Prize, the Edinburgh First Book Award and the Saboteur Awards and longlisted for the Edge Hill Short Story Prize, and Supper Club won the Guardian 'Not the Booker' Prize, was named as a Book of the Year 2019 by TIME and Vogue, and has been translated into six languages. Lara Williams lives in Manchester and is a contributor to the Guardian, Independent, Times Literary Supplement, Vice, Dazed and others.

Slyly poignant and wickedly funny... A serious vibe * Cosmopolitan * Readers who enjoy Melissa Broder and Ottessa Moshfegh will appreciate this surreal trip through a troubled woman's psyche * Booklist * Lara Williams is the queen of smart modern satire. I could read her all day -- Emma Jane Unsworth, author of 'Adults' Williams succeeds in satirising the seemingly unmockable: the overwhelming absurdities of modern life... * Literary Review * I have never read anything like this... Deliciously unpredictable -- Mateo Askaripour, author of 'Black Buck' Equal parts satire and elegy, coming from the very edge of the abyss... Unsettling, risk-taking, profoundly moving - I loved it -- Livia Franchini, author of 'Shelf Life' Astonishing, subversive and darkly funny - another dazzler of a novel from Lara Williams -- Zeba Talkhani, author of 'My Past is a Foreign Country' Mischievous and thought-provoking * Sheerluxe * Slyly humorous, sharp, courageous and at times devastating... The Odyssey is a wildly original satire -- Frances Cha, author of 'If I Had Your Face'