CATEGORY

From the author of Music for Torchingan uplifting and apocalyptic tale set in Los Angeles about one mans efforts to bring himself back to life

Since her debut in 1989, A. M. Homes has been among the boldest and most original voices of her generation, acclaimed for the psychological accuracy and unnerving emotional intensity of her storytelling. Her keen ability to explore how extraordinary the ordinary can be is at the heart of her touching and funny new novel, her first in six years.

Richard Novak is a modern-day Everyman, a middle-aged divorc trading stocks out of his home. He has done such a good job getting his life under control that he needs no oneexcept his trainer, nutritionist, and housekeeper. He is functionally dead and doesnt even notice until two incidentsan attack of intense pain that lands him in the emergency room, and the discovery of an expanding sinkhole outside his houseconspire to hurl him back into the world. On his way home from the hospital, Richard forms the first of many new relationships: He meets Anhil, the doughnut shop owner, an immigrant who dreams big. He finds a weeping housewife in the produce section of the supermarket, helps save a horse that has fallen into the sinkhole, daringly rescues a woman from the trunk of her kidnappers car, and, after the sinkhole claims his house and he has to relocate to a Malibu rental, he befriends a reluctant counterculture icon. In the end, Richard is also brought back in closer touch with his familyhis aging parents, his brilliant brother, the beloved ex-wife whom he still desires, and finally, before the storys breathtaking finale, with his estranged son Ben.

The promised land of Los Angelesa surreal city of earthquakes, wildfires, mudslides, and feral Chihuahuasis also very much a character in This Book Will Save Your Life. A vivid, revealing novel about compassion, transformation, and what can happen if you are willing to lose yourself and open up to the world around you, it should significantly broaden Homess already substantial audience.