{"product_id":"gunk-baby-9781474620918","title":"Gunk Baby","description":"\u003cb\u003eBook Synopsis\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFrom Stella Prize-shortlisted author Jamie Marina Lau comes an inventive, confronting and unforgettable novel about consumerism and class - CONVENIENCE STORE WOMAN meets Ottessa Moshfegh and Bret Easton Ellis\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eTrade Review\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eA tender horror story, all the more haunting for being so familiar, \u003ci\u003eGunk Baby\u003c\/i\u003e captures the plight of the body - its fragility, its need for connection - in a world of surveillance and synthetic calm. Lau's voice is cool, precise yet unfailingly human, taking aim at mall culture, work culture and consumer culture, and revealing them as excuses we whisper to ourselves as we lurch slowly towards a luxurious void\u003c\/b\u003e -- ROISIN KIBERD, author of The Disconnect\u003cbr\u003eA new, detuned world, globalized but specific, casually weird,  \u003cb\u003eJamie Marina Lau's sensibility is elliptical and it is unique;  here is a new existence among the malls of instant consumerism\u003c\/b\u003e -- ALAN WARNER\u003cbr\u003eA dissociative meditation on a world that has come to feel increasingly meaningless, \u003cb\u003eLau's second novel harks back to an older era of Australian fiction\u003c\/b\u003e . . . her prose combines the languid torpor of Michael Bible with the unease of Yoko Ogawa's more macabre work  . . . \u003cb\u003eShe reminds us of the adventurousness that once saw local writers and directors win both sales and critical acclaim\u003c\/b\u003e . . . Their spirits are sorely missing from the landscape today. Lau is to be commended for keeping them alive * GUARDIAN *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAn original and unforgettable read\u003c\/b\u003e * COSMOPOLITAN, Best New Fiction Books *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eJamie Marina Lau's style is captivating\u003c\/b\u003e - you're drawn into the stagnant world of this Australian suburbia, and everything seems bizarre and off in a way that makes you feel constantly uncomfortable * INDEPENDENT *\u003cbr\u003eA disorienting and sinister consumerist dystopia. \u003ci\u003eGunk Baby\u003c\/i\u003e is the blackest sort of satire on post-industrial anomie, though it has a sharp sense of intellectual playfulness too . . . \u003cb\u003eFans of Bret Easton Ellis, J.G. Ballard or Chuck Palahniuk's \u003ci\u003eFight Club\u003c\/i\u003e will lap up the affectless nihilism of Lau's vision: it reopens a peculiar vein of postmodern darkness that seemed to have all but collapsed in Australian fiction\u003c\/b\u003e * SYDNEY MORNING HERALD *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eA book like this - that doesn't take the expected route\u003c\/b\u003e, that gambles on a quiet and potentially difficult-to-access protagonist\u003cb\u003e - is a gift\u003c\/b\u003e . . . \u003cb\u003eLau's strength as an author shines\u003c\/b\u003e in this space she has carved out for herself . . . \u003ci\u003eGunk baby, \u003c\/i\u003edespite its surreal aura, exposes power structures and daily violence in a way that \u003cb\u003ewill make you think about the real world a little deeper\u003c\/b\u003e * THE MONTHLY *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWhat a novel - as it is formally defined - should be: novel\u003c\/b\u003e. Lau's talent is in excavating the psyche of her characters and their environments . . . \u003ci\u003eGunk Baby\u003c\/i\u003e is \u003cb\u003ethe artistic equivalent of an ongoing disintegration, an experimental critique of the absurdities of consumer culture\u003c\/b\u003e * SATURDAY PAPER *\u003cbr\u003eThe poison of capitalism and consumerism seeps through the pages of \u003ci\u003eGunk Baby\u003c\/i\u003e so subtly that the reader barely notices until they are drowning in it . . . \u003cb\u003eA writer of the Zeitgeist\u003c\/b\u003e, Lau uses a distinctly 'online' voice that speaks to the disconnect of the present generation and to the bleak, capital-driven path humanity took to get there. \u003cb\u003eAn audacious, nihilistic novel\u003c\/b\u003e * AUSTRALIA BOOK REVIEW *\u003cbr\u003eLargely set in the hermetic world of a shopping centre, this clever narrative is cut through with \u003cb\u003eincisive critiques of consumer culture\u003c\/b\u003e and commentary on the hard work it takes to be in the company of other people. \u003cb\u003eLau's is an exciting and distinctive voice\u003c\/b\u003e and \u003ci\u003eGunk Baby \u003c\/i\u003eis our \u003cb\u003eFiction Book of the Month\u003c\/b\u003e * READINGS Book of the Month *\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eConfident, assured and excitingly unique\u003c\/b\u003e . . . While the ideas are firmly drawn from the real world, Lau deftly uses the dreamy yet tense atmosphere she has created to underscore the horror of the everyday. \u003cb\u003eReaders who enjoyed Ottessa Moshfegh's \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003ci\u003eHomesick for Another World\u003c\/i\u003e or Yoko Ogawa's \u003ci\u003eThe Memory Police \u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003ewill find much to appreciate in Gunk Baby -- BOOKS AND PUBLISHING\u003cbr\u003eLau's dizzying prose is like a series of crazy neon-lit performance art -- The Stella Prize Judges on PINK MOUNTAIN ON LOCUST ISLAND\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eGunk Baby\u003c\/i\u003e plunges the reader into a stagnant Australian suburbia where everything seems bizarre and uncomfortable * SUNDAY POST *","brand":"Orion Publishing Co","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":48739617210711,"sku":"9781474620918","price":9.49,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0817\/1739\/5799\/files\/9781474620918.jpg?v=1720052747","url":"https:\/\/bookcurl.com\/products\/gunk-baby-9781474620918","provider":"Book Curl","version":"1.0","type":"link"}