The Gone-Away World
Format:Paperback
Publisher:Cornerstone
Published:29th Jan '09
Should be back in stock very soon
The literary debut of 2008 - part adventure, part comic opera, part geek nirvana
Gonzo Lubitsch, professional hero and troubleshooter, is hired to put it out - but there's more to the fire, and the Pipe itself, than meets the eye.
Equal parts raucous adventure, comic odyssey and Romantic Epic, The Gone-Away World is a story of - among other things - love and loss;
The Jorgmund Pipe is the backbone of the world, and it's on fire. Gonzo Lubitsch, professional hero and troubleshooter, is hired to put it out - but there's more to the fire, and the Pipe itself, than meets the eye. The job will take Gonzo and his best friend, our narrator, back to their own beginnings and into the dark heart of the Jorgmund Company itself.
Equal parts raucous adventure, comic odyssey and Romantic Epic, The Gone-Away World is a story of - among other things - love and loss; of ninjas, pirates, politics; of curious heroism in strange and dangerous places; and of a friendship stretched beyond its limits. But it also the story of a world, not unlike our own, in desperate need of heroes - however unlikely they may seem.
Its scope and ambition are extraordinary, its execution is often breathtaking, and its style is by turns hilarious, outrageous, devastating, hip and profound ... Hugely entertaining * Independent on Sunday *
Breathtakingly ambitious ... A bubbling cosmic stew of a book, written with such exuberant imagination that you are left breathless by its sheer ingenuity * Observer *
[A] post-apocalyptic triumph ... Immensely rewarding ... Genuinely terrifying * The Times *
A stunning debut * Scotland on Sunday *
Exuberant...Wildly inventive -- Michael Gove * The Times *
There are delightful moments aplenty ... Any author who has come up with the beautifully silly plan of melding a kung-fu epic with an Iraq-war satire and a Mad Max adventure has to be worth keeping an eye on * Guardian *
A debut novel of the kind that comes along only once every couple of years, overflowing with imagination yet powered by the kind of cleverly twisting plot that marks him out as a master storyteller ... A quirkily original writer * The Scotsman *
Has the pace and action of an episode of 24 ... The agility of the narrative is one of the great strengths of this book ... Harkaway is robustly confident ... Particularly effective are his Matrix-like fight scenes, brought to life in meticulous yet flowing prose * The Times *
A stunning debut ... By turns thrilling, silly, gripping, crazy, daring and outrageous. I loved every minute ... The Gone-Away World is brakes-off fiction * Scotland on Sunday *
I loved it...exuberant, mind-bending science-fiction/fantasy adventure about truckers, weapons that wreck the very fabric of existence, foul-mouthed drill instructors, ninjas and stuff like that. But by golly it's well written, funny and enjoyable -- Sam Leith * Daily Mail *
ISBN: 9780099519973
Dimensions: 198mm x 130mm x 35mm
Weight: 405g
592 pages