The Last Days of the Lacuna Cabal - Hardcover

Dixon, Sean

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0007268564 ISBN 13: 9780007268566

Publisher: HarperCollins, 2008

Synopsis

An original, mischievous rites of passage novel which will delight fans of offbeat fiction such as ‘Salmon Fishing in the Yemen’ and ‘A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian’.

The Lacuna Cabal Montreal Young Women's Book Club is THE foremost book club in Canada, no, in the world. Priding themselves on their good taste, intelligent discussions and impeccable opinions, they are a group of misfits and oddballs, living on the edge of normality. There are only two rules: what Missy says goes (ok, there is a nod to democracy but let's be honest here) and NO BOYS. EVER.

Of course, the premier book club in the world must read the first book ever written: 'The Epic of Gilgamesh'. But this monumental book leads them to break all their rules, shed members who end up missing out on EVERYTHING, and travel across the open seas to Bahrain in search of a wise man who'll hopefully have all the answers.

Original, funny, quixotic and ultimately very moving,The Last Days of the Lacuna Cabal is set in a time of upheaval: the Iraq war is exploding and people across the world are marching in protest. It's the story of a group of friends who find a family of sorts within their book group, who learn to cope with love, and the lack of it, loss, and the lack of that, and with growing up in a world that is falling apart.

About this title

Review:

‘The novel everyone will be talking about’
London Lite

‘[A] sweet, unpredictable novel...ingenious and openly written‘
Time Out

‘The Lacuna Cabal Montreal Young Women’s Book Club is unconventional in more ways than one – namely that its members don’t do much reading! But they do share a bond and help each other to cope with the changing world in this fab book. 4 stars’
OK! Magazine

'A clever little book...you'll love it' Daily Express

‘A sort of Tristram Shandy for the twenty-first century...It’ll blow your mind.’
Michael Redhill

‘Dixon's talents, however, extend beyond theatrics: flashbacks and set pieces are tightly written and offer the full-bodied coherence one expects from a novel.’
Quill & Quire

'What makes Sean Dixon's first novel so electrifyingly smart and charming is its abundant passion.'
The Georgia Straight

'[In] this ambitious book...Dixon has fashioned his make-believe to be relevant, offered a satisfying harvest from early planted seeds, and embedded some fine intellectual levity.’
The Globe and Mail

'Every chapter is filled with biff, bang, pow surprises! Suspend your disbelief and thrill in the oddities.'
She Does the City.com

‘Sean Dixon is a worthy successor to some of Canada’s foremost authors. He is in possession of an imaginative gift akin to Timothy Findley, the erudition and style of Robertson Davies and the off beat humor of Mordecai Richler. And like them, he is deserving of recognition and a following south of the border’
Bruce Bauman, author of And The Word Was

From the Publisher:

We love this book. If we could, we would press a copy into the hands of everyone we met. No, why stop there? Make that everyone we ever sat next to on the bus, everyone who was sitting alone at a bar waiting for a friend, every unsuspecting person soaking up the sunshine in the park, whispering, `Try this one; you'll love it.'

And we're not alone (luckily; it's never a nice feeling). `The Last Days of the Lacuna Cabal' has been voted one of the best novels of 2007 in Canada where it was first published (it's known as `The Girls Who Saw Everything' over there).

Bloggers in Canada have taken it to their hearts, recommending it to their friends: `Every chapter is filled with biff, bang, pow surprises! Suspend your disbelief and thrill in the oddities' says She Does the City. The Literary Word says, `It's an unpredictable read filled with so much energy, strong emotion, and heartfelt tenderness. A great book to curl up with as the evenings grow colder.' And Three Squirrels in a Pressure Cooker says, `The most enjoyable book that I have read this year is `The Girls Who Saw Everything', by author Sean Dixon ... I loved it start to finish, and lost a full day devoted to doing nothing but following the adventures of the Lacuna Cabal Montreal Young Women's Book Club. If you're to buy one book this year, make it this one. Seriously, there is magic here, beautiful magic.'

But, as publishers, we can shout our passion for a book from the rooftops and sometimes it just gets caught up in the cacophony of the hundreds of thousands of other wonderful books out there waiting to be read. And so, this being a novel with a difference, we launched it with a difference. The cover you see at the top of this page is the winner of a design competition we ran with the Saatchi Gallery Online. We received a thousand entries and it was so exciting to see the many different interpretations of the novel. We think we have the perfect cover for the book. You'll have to read it to see if you agree with us...

About this edition

• Publisher: HarperCollins
• Publication date: 2008
• ISBN 10: 0007268564
• ISBN 13: 9780007268566
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 344