Lionel Shriver

Eva es una mujer satisfecha consigo misma. Es autora y editora de guías de viaje para gente tan urbana y feliz como ella. Casada desde hace años con Franklin, decide, ya cerca de los cuarenta, tener un hijo. Y el producto de tan indecisa decision sera Kevin. Pero, casi desde el comienzo, nada se parece a los inefables mitos familiares de la clase media urbana y feliz. Y cuando nace, Kevin es el tipico bebe dificil que tortura a los padres. Y, con el tiempo, se convertira en el terror de las niñeras, en un adolescente terrible, en el antiheroe a quien nada le interesa sino la belleza de la pura maldad. Y en ese trayecto que va desde los primeros desencantos de Eva hasta la sangrienta epifania del joven Kevin, dos dias antes de cumplir los dieciseis años, el niño es un enigma para su madre, que nunca le ha podido querer. "Excelente: por su inteligencia, su lucidez, su sentido del humor -extraño, macabro a veces, pero siempre eficaz- y tambien, desde luego, por la audacia con que ataca uno de los mitos, el de la maternidad feliz, mas intocables de la cultura en que vivimos" (Laura Freixas).

Estados Unidos, 2029. Un siglo después, ha vuelto a suceder. El dólar se desploma, la inflación se dispara, el país se dirige hacia la bancarrota. Y la familia Mandible, protagonista de esta sagaz y

Una novela feroz y explosiva, repleta de temas candentes, que toma el culto a la forma física como mirador desde el que observar la sociedad americana. Alergica a toda clase de actividades grupales, Serenata Terpsichore, la protagonista de esta novela, es una artista de voz en off que ha dedicado su vida a hacer ejercicio fisico, a correr, a nadar, a montar en bicicleta.Ahora, al cumplir sesenta, tanta actividad le pasa una dolorosa factura en forma de artrosis. Por su parte, Remington Alabaster, su siempre sedentario marido, acaba de ser prejubilado a la fuerza del Departamento de Transportes de Albany tras un confuso enfrentamiento con su nueva jefa, y decide escoger precisamente ese momento para descubrir las bondades de la gimnasia y correr una maraton. Tras apuntarse a la fiebre del fitness, cada vez mas presente en el mundo moderno, el una vez moderado Remington se convierte en un narcisista insufrible, y contrata a una estricta (y seductora) entrenadora personal, junto a la que participara en competiciones cada vez mas exigentes: despues de la maraton, medio Mettleman, el triatlon completo… Tan furiosa como preocupada, Serenata descubrira que no conviene subestimar la tenacidad de un prejubilado con mucho tiempo

Lionel Shriver aplica su sagaz, irónica y feroz mirada al formato breve. Su primera e imprescindible colección de cuentos. Un regalo de boda muy personal se convierte en una fuente de disputas;

Published to coincide with Wimbledon What price do you pay for prizing success over love? 'Love me, love my game' says twenty-three year-old Willy Novinsky. Ever since she picked up a racquet at the age of four, tennis has been Willy's one love, until the day she meets Eric Oberdorf. She's a middle-ranked professional tennis player and he's a Princeton graduate who took up playing tennis at the age of eighteen. Low-ranked but untested, Eric, too, aims to make his mark on the international tennis circuit. But, as Eric's ranking climbs, rivalry turns to resentment, and Willy risks losing everything.

From the Orange Prize-winning author of We Need to Talk About Kevin.Allergic to group activities of any kind, all her life Serenata has run, swum, and cycled on her lonesome. But now that she's hit 60, all that physical activity has destroyed her knees. As she contemplates surgery with dread, her previously sedentary husband Remington, recently and ignominiously redundant, chooses this precise moment to discover exercise.Which should be good for his health, right? Yet as he joins the cult of fitness that seems increasingly to consume the whole of the Western world, her once-modest husband burgeons into an unbearable narcissist. Ignoring all his other obligations in the service of extreme sport, he engages a saucy, taunting personal trainer named Bambi, who treats his wife with contempt. When Remington announces his intention to compete in a legendarily gruelling triathlon, MettleMan, Serenata is sure he's going to end up injured or dead but the stubbornness of an ageing man in Lycra is not to be underestimated.The story of an obsession, of a marriage, of a betrayal: The Motion of the Body Through Space is Lionel Shriver at her hilarious, sharp-eyed, audacious best.

LIONEL SHRIVEREver since Willy Novinsky picked up a racquet at the age of four, tennis has been her one love, until the day she meets Eric Oberdorf. She's a middle-ranked professional tennis player and he's a Princeton graduate who took up playing tennis at the age of eighteen. They marry. Married life starts well but soon gives way to full-tilt competition. Front Cover

What do you pack for the rest of your life? The explosive new novel from the Orange Prize-winning author of We Need to Talk About Kevin Shepherd Knacker has been saving all his working life for a one way ticket away from the daily grind. When he sells his handyman business for $1million, 'The Afterlife' seems tantalisingly within reach. Yet his wife has concocted one reason after another why now isn't the time to go. Determined to take the plunge, Shep announces that he is leaving for an island off the coast of Tanzania: with or without her. However, Glynis has an announcement of her own -- she needs his health insurance. Illustrating how a marriage is both stressed and strengthened by medical crisis, So Much for That puts the uncomfortable fiscal question: how much is one life worth? Enlivened by Shriver's signature acerbity and political outrage, it's surely the funniest and most entertaining novel about illness and death one's ever likely to read.

Lionel Shriver'Love me, love my game', says twenty-three year-old Willy Novinsky. Ever since she picked up a racquet at the age of four, tennis has been Willy's one love, until the day she meets Eric Oberdorf. She's a middle-ranked professional tennis player and he's a Princeton graduate who took up playing tennis at the age of eighteen. Low-ranked but untested, Eric, too, aims to make his mark on the international tennis circuit. Willy beholds compatibility spiced with friendly rivalry, and discovers her first passion outside a tennis court. They marry. Married life starts well, but animated shop talk and blissful love-making soon give way to full-tilt competition over who can rise to the top first. Driven and gifted, Willy maintains the lead until she severs her knee ligaments in a devastating spill. As Willy recuperates, her ranking plummets whilst her husband's climbs, until he is eventually playing in the US Open. Anguished at falling short of her lifelong dream and resentful of her husband's success, Willy slides irresistibly toward the first quiet tragedy of her young life.

With dry wit and psychological acuity, this near-future novel explores the aftershocks of an economically devastating U.S. sovereign debt default on four generations of a once-prosperous American family. Down-to-earth and perfectly realistic in scale, this is not an over-the-top Blade Runner tale. It is not science fiction.In 2029, the United States is engaged in a bloodless world war that will wipe out the savings of millions of American families. Overnight, on the international currency exchange, the almighty dollar plummets in value, to be replaced by a new global currency, the bancor. In retaliation, the president declares that America will default on its loans. Deadbeat Nation being unable to borrow, the government prints money to cover its bills. What little remains to savers is rapidly eaten away by runaway inflation.The Mandibles have been counting on a sizable fortune filtering down when their ninety-seven-year-old patriarch dies. Once the inheritance turns to ash, each family member must contend with disappointment, but alsoas the U.S. economy spirals into dysfunctionthe challenge of sheer survival.Recently affluent, Avery is petulant that she cant buy olive oil, while her sister, Florence, absorbs strays into her cramped household. An expat author, their aunt, Nollie, returns from abroad at seventy-three to a country thats unrecognizable. Her brother, Carter, fumes at caring for their demented stepmother, now that an assisted living facility isnt affordable. Only Florences oddball teenage son, Willing, an economics autodidact, will save this formerly august American family from the streets.The Mandibles is about money. Thus it is necessarily about bitterness, rivalry, and selfishnessbut also about surreal generosity, sacrifice, and transformative adaptation to changing circumstances.

From the Orange Prize-winning author of WE NEED TO TALK ABOUT KEVIN comes a bold and savage story of the intersection of politics and human relationships, set in turbulent Northern Ireland.Having abandoned Philadelphia for the life of an international nomad, Estrin Lancaster has a taste for hot spots. She now finds herself in Belfast, a city scarred by twenty years of ritualised violence.As the former purveyor of his own bomb-disposal service, Farrell OPhelan courts the company of destruction. Technically a Catholic, he shuns allegiance of any kind.For these two, normal life is anathema; love is a trap. What ensues is an affair between two loners who are beset with a fear of domesticity and a hunger for devastation.

Lionel ShriverTwo years ago, Eva Khatchadourian's son, Kevin, murdered seven of his fellow high-school students, a cafeteria worker, and a popular algebra teacher. Because he was only 15 at the time of the killings, he received a lenient sentence and is now in a prison for young offenders in upstate New York. Two years ago, Eva Khatchadourian's son, Kevin, murdered seven of his fellow high-school students, a cafeteria worker, and a popular algebra teacher. Because he was only fifteen at the time of the killings, he received a lenient sentence and is now in a prison for young offenders in upstate New York. Telling the story of Kevin's upbringing, Eva addresses herself to her estranged husband through a series of letters. Fearing that her own shortcomings may have shaped what her son has become, she confesses to a deep, long-standing ambivalence about both motherhood in general and Kevin in particular. How much is her fault? Lionel Shriver tells a compelling, absorbing, and resonant story while framing these horrifying tableaux of teenage carnage as metaphors for the larger tragedy - the tragedy of a country where everything works, nobody starves, and anything can be bought but a sense of purpose.

Lionel ShriverLionel Shriver tells a compelling, absorbing and resonant story while framing these horrifying tableaux of teenage carnage as metaphors for the larger tragedy - the tragedy of a country where everything works, nobody starves, and anything can be bought but a sense of purpose.

First ever story collection from the inimitable Lionel Shriver This landmark publication, the first collection of stories from a master of the form, explores the idea of "property" in both senses of the word: real estate, and stuff. These sharp, brilliantly imaginative pieces illustrate how our possessions act as proxies for ourselves, and how tussles over ownership articulate the power dynamics of our relationships. In Shriver's world, we may possess people and objects and places, but in turn they possess us. In the stunning novella "The Standing Chandelier" (`a brutal treat': Daily Mail), a woman with a history of attracting other women's antagonism creates a deeply personal wedding present for her best friend and his wife-to-be. In "Domestic Terrorism," a thirty-something son refuses to leave home, resulting in a standoff that renders him a Millennial cause celebre. In "The ChapStick," a middle-aged man subjugated by service to his elderly father discovers that the last place you should finally assert yourself is airport security. In "Vermin," an artistic Brooklyn couple's purchase of a ramshackle house destroys their once passionate relationship. In "The Subletter," two women, both foreign conflict junkies, fight over claim to a territory that doesn't belong to either. This immensely readable collection showcases the biting insight that has made Lionel Shriver one of the most acclaimed authors of our time, described by the Sunday Times as `a brilliant writer' with `a strong, clear and strangely seductive voice'.

Avec une plume plus incisive que jamais et un humour ravageur, Lionel Shriver livre un roman explosif sur un couple de sexagénaires en crise, dressant au passage un portrait mordant de nos sociétés obsedees par la sante et le culte du corps. Une bombe de provocation qui prouve, s'il le fallait encore, que Lionel Shriver est une des plus fines observatrices de notre tempsUn beau matin, au petit-dejeuner, Remington fait une annonce tonitruante a son epouse Renata : cette annee, il courra un marathon. Tiens donc ? Ce sexagenaire certes encore fringant mais pour qui l'exercice s'est longtemps resume a faire les quelques pas qui le separaient de sa voiture mettrait a profit sa retraite anticipee pour se mettre enfin au sport ? Belle ambition ! D'autant plus ironique que dans le couple, le plus sportif des deux a toujours ete Renata jusqu'a ce que des problemes de genoux ne l'obligent a la sedentarite.Qu'a cela ne tienne, c'est certainement juste une passade.Sauf que contre toute attente, Remington s'accroche. Mieux, Remington y prend gout. Les week-ends sont desormais consacres a l'entrainement, sous la houlette de Bambi, la tres sexy et tres autoritaire coach. Et quand Remington commence a envisager tres serieusement de participer a un Iron Man, Renata realise que son mari, jadis debonnaire et volontiers empote, a laisse place a un etre arrogant et impitoyable. Face a cette fuite en avant sportive, leur couple resistera-t-il ?

AprésáQuatre heures..., Shriver revient avec une nouvelle bombe. Porté par une construction originale et efficace, un roman explosif sur un couple de quinquas nouant un pacte quasi-faustien pour s éviter la decheance de leurs vieux jours. Une reflexion mordante et passionnante sur notre rapport avec la vieillesse et l art delicat de se preparer a la fin.

Avec une plume plus incisive que jamais et un humour ravageur, Lionel Shriver livre un roman explosif sur un couple de sexagénaires en crise, dressant au passage un portrait mordant de nos sociétés obsedees par la sante et le culte du corps. Une bombe de provocation qui prouve, s'il le fallait encore, que Lionel Shriver est une des plus fines observatrices de notre tempsUn beau matin, au petit-dejeuner, Remington fait une annonce tonitruante a son epouse Renata : cette annee, il courra un marathon. Tiens donc ? Ce sexagenaire certes encore fringant mais pour qui l'exercice s'est longtemps resume a faire les quelques pas qui le separaient de sa voiture mettrait a profit sa retraite anticipee pour se mettre enfin au sport ? Belle ambition ! D'autant plus ironique que dans le couple, le plus sportif des deux a toujours ete Renata jusqu'a ce que des problemes de genoux ne l'obligent a la sedentarite.Qu'a cela ne tienne, c'est certainement juste une passade.Sauf que contre toute attente, Remington s'accroche. Mieux, Remington y prend gout. Les week-ends sont desormais consacres a l'entrainement, sous la houlette de Bambi, la tres sexy et tres autoritaire coach. Et quand Remington commence a envisager tres serieusement de participer a un Iron Man, Renata realise que son mari, jadis debonnaire et volontiers empote, a laisse place a un etre arrogant et impitoyable. Face a cette fuite en avant sportive, leur couple resistera-t-il ?

From the award-winning novelist and short story writer, Lionel Shriver, comes a literary gem, a story about love and the power of a gift.When Weston Babansky receives an extravagant engagement present from his best friend (and old flame) Jillian Frisk, he doesn't quite know what to make of it - or how to get it past his fiancée. Especially as it's a massive, handmade, intensely personal sculpture that they'd have to live with forever.As the argument rages about whether Jillian's gift was an act of pure platonic generosity or something more insidious, battle lines are drawn…Can men and women ever be friends? Just friends?Described by the Sunday Times as 'a brilliant writer' with 'a strong, clear and strangely seductive voice', Lionel Shriver has written a glittering examination of friendship, ownership and the conditions of love.