Divorce is in the Air

(Paperback)

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Description

A provocative, acerbic novel about love - and the end of love - and how hard it can be to let go Joan-Marc's out of work, he's alone, he has a heart condition, his mother's addicted to pills, he can't stand his sister. Otherwise, life is beautiful. And there's a lot that his estranged second wife doesn't know about him. But in Divorce is in the Air he now sets out to tell her. He begins with the failure of his first marriage, describing a holiday taken in a last-ditch attempt to salvage a once passionate relationship. Recalling this ill-fated trip triggers a life-story's worth of flashbacks. From pivotal childhood scenes - his earliest sexual encounters, his father's suicide - he moves on through the years, hopscotching between Barcelona and Madrid, describing a life of indulgence and of appetites. The result is an unapologetic, daring, acerbic novel by an electrifying young writer about love and the end of love, and how hard it can be to let go.

Reviews

Scathingly funny * New York Times *
One of the most accomplished stylists of his generation ... the novel reads almost like a Catalan lad-lit mash-up with writers of the American tradition of Updike, Roth or Bellow * New York Times Book Review *
A book so believable that even when it is at its most horribly funny, you wonder if you should really be sighing with solidarity Torns stylishly assured universal excursion into one mans breakdown is lively and convincing, and resonates with the remorseless panic of modern existence -- Eileen Battersby * Irish Times *
Divorce is in the Air is zesty and acerbic, and the heralding of a brilliant, virtuosic new writing talent. Torn has certainly set out his stall as a man to keep an eye on. -- Tanya Sweeney * Irish Independent *
Very funny, fluent and as nasty as real life. -- Eileen Battersby * Irish Times, Book of the Year *

Author Bio

Gonzalo Torne is the author of two previous novels published in Spain, for which he won the Premio Jaen de Novela and was a finalist for the Premio Nacional de Narrativa. He has also translated work by William Wordsworth and John Ashbery into Spanish. He lives in Barcelona. Divorce is in the Air is translated from the Spanish by Megan McDowell. She is the translator of many modern and contemporary South American authors.