Critics' Opinion:
Readers' rating:
Published Jun 2009
208 pages
Genre: Literary Fiction
Publication Information
A gasoline tanker truck is "stuck" in the Midtown Tunnel. New Yorkers are panicked ... Is this the next big attack? The streets of Manhattan are welded solid with traffic. Meanwhile, Alex, an artist, and Ruth must get their beloved dachshund, whose back legs have suddenly become paralyzed, to the animal hospital sixty blocks north.
This is also the weekend that Alex and Ruth must sell their apartment. While house hunters traipse through their home during their open house, husband and wife wait by the phone to hear from the animal hospital. During the course of forty-eight hours, as the missing driver of the gasoline truck terrorizes the city, the price of their apartment becomes a barometer for collective hope and despair, while the real estate market spikes and troughs with every breaking news story.
In shifting points of view—Alex's, Ruth's, and the little dog's—man, woman, and one small tenacious beast try to make sense of the cacophony of rumors, opinions, and innuendos coming from news anchors, cable TV pundits, pollsters, bomb experts, hostages, witnesses, real estate agents, house hunters, bargain seekers, howling dogs, veterinarians, nurses, and cab drivers.
A moving, deftly told novel of ultrahigh-urban anxiety.
"Starred Review. [A] spare and surprisingly gripping novel." - Publishers Weekly
"The story is touching, with more than a little wry humor aimed at the easily agitated media and the vagaries of real estate in New York." - Library Journal
"Could have been loopy in less deft hands, but Ciment ... keeps things lively and edgy throughout." - Kirkus Reviews
"Ciment’s charming comedy of concerns has remarkable resonance." - Booklist
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Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Jill Ciment was born in Montreal, Canada. She is the author of three novels, The Tattoo Artist, Teeth of the Dog, and The Law of Falling Bodies; a collection of short stories, Small Claims; and a memoir, Half a Life. Ciment is a professor of English at the University of Florida. She lives in Gainesville, Florida.
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