Empire State - Hardcover

Bateman, Colin

3.8

437 ratings by Goodreads

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0002254174 ISBN 13: 9780002254175

Publisher: HarperCollins, 1997

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Wild American adventure of two Irish exiles, culminating in the accidental kidnapping of the US President on top of the Empire State Building.

It’s bad enough having a name like Nathan Jones – unless you’re a Supremes fan, which Nathan isn’t – but when his girlfriend leaves him (for a drag queen) and he gets mugged, then handcuffed to a bed and cut up in a misunderstanding with an S&M hooker, it looks as if things can’t get any worse for this exile in the Big Apple. But they can! Will Nathan get his girl back? Will the President survive imprisonment by a psychotic white supremist in (rapidly melting) black-face? Will veteran lift-operator Sam McClusky get his job back? Find out in Empire State.

The stage is set for a vintage Bateman adventure, which takes the world of politics – international, racial and sexual – and holds it hostage atop the most famous building on Earth.

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Review:

Divorcing Jack:
‘As sharp as a pint of snake-bite... Richly paranoid and very funny’
Sunday Times

Cycle of Violence:
‘Fast-paced, very black and very funny. Roddy Doyle meets Carl Hiaasen’
Independent on Sunday

Of Wee Sweetie Mice and Men:
‘Fast, furious, riotously funny, and at the end, never a dry eye in the house’
Mail on Sunday

From the Back Cover:

Possibly because it's been tough living with the same name as a Supremes song, possibly because of the indelible horror of one night in his Northern Irish past, Nathan Jones is a man with a temper.

When his girlfriend Lisa leaves him in New York, Nathan has only his new job for company in the liveliest, loneliest city in the world.

Nathan is a security guard at the Empire State Building, recently acquired by computer billionaire, Michael Tate, and about to be visited by President Michael Keneally, an army of FBI men and one George Burley of Alabama, a white supremacist with the President at the top of his assassination Top Ten.

Soon the stage is set for a vintage Bateman adventure, wild, romantic and darkly, dangerously funny. 'Empire State' takes the world of politics – international, racial and sexual – and holds it hostage atop the most famous building on Earth.

"Bateman on epic form in gloriously over-the-top saga"
DAILY TELEGRAPH

"A hugely enjoyable novel...blessed with a beautiful sense of irony...It's like Carl Hiaasen, Tom Wolfe, and Roddy Doyle at their best"
THE HERALD

"There is more to Bateman than a racy plot. His prose is intelligent as well as aesthetically satisfying, his dialogue toughly funny and tone-perfect, his American observations queasily true"
MAIL ON SUNDAY

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