The Gift

(Paperback)

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Description

'THE GIFT is the best book you'll give yourself all year. Don't waste it on anyone else -- they don't deserve it.' Will Self Philip has a lot on his mind. At home, in his unnecessarily large, excessively expensive house in south London, he is attempting to become a Taoist master of love with his wife Alice, but his quest is forever being interrupted by the requests of his twin daughters: Can we have a pony -- please I want to go to boarding school -- please At work, in his shed/office at the bottom of the garden, between countless games of Minesweep and FreeCell, Philip is trying to pay the mortgage by writing instruction manuals for Korean bread-making machines. And, at parties where he is concerned that he is not taken seriously (he has been variously mistaken as a doctor/waiter and sinologist) Philip tells the world he is a scriptwriter, even though all he has managed to pen is a story he calls Wang the Unlucky Scholar. But, above all, Philip is worrying about his best friends Sean and Barry. The problem is simple: they give great presents. Their gifts are exquisite: a full set of Italian crockery, a handmade corkscrew from Venice. They give them indiscriminately: on birthdays

Reviews

'This fever dream of masculine anxiety and the bad manners of affluence resolves into something unexpectedly wise and generous: a complete story and a very good one.' Jonathan Franzen

Author Bio

David Flusfeder was born November 1960 in New Jersey, and has had his short stories published in numerous anthologies and magazines. His novels to date are A Film by Spencer Ludwig (2010), The Pagan House (2007), The Gift (2003), Morocco (2000), Like Plastic (winner of Encore Award 1997) and Man Kills Woman (1993). He has taught creative writing at Birkbeck College, Morley College, the Arvon Foundation and Pentonville Prison. David Flusfeder is married with two children and lives in London.