Going Out [Paperback]

Scarlett Thomas (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: June 8, 2004

Luke is allergic to everything. He spends his days in a sterile safe-haven designed to keep out all light and dirt, while everything he knows about the world comes from books, movies, the internet and whatever his best-friend Julie tells him. He would do anything to go outside.

Julie, brilliant and kind, could be out changing the world. Unfortunately, she’s too afraid of airplane crashes, highway accidents, and potentially life-threatening bacteria to leave her hometown, her pointless waitress job, or Luke.

Charlotte’s boyfriend dropped dead from a brain hemorrhage. She disappeared for awhile, but now she’s decided that she misses her friends.

David has just been diagnosed with testicular cancer. Consequently, he’s no longer wants to spend his days making pizza to pay for school. His priorities in life are changing; he just doesn’t know how, yet.

Leanne has just discovered that she may or may not have magic powers.

When this motley bunch befriends a lottery winner with a generous heart, they all embark on a hysterical and heartwarming journey in search of the healer who just might be able to cure Luke, and perhaps give them the answers they didn’t know they were looking for.

Editorial Reviews

From The New Yorker

Thomas is one of a group of young British writers who call themselves the New Puritans and advocate telling stories as straightforwardly as possible. Here a young man allergic to sunlight spends his days in a heavily curtained suburban bedroom, his impressions of the outside world entirely mediated through American TV sitcoms. Meanwhile, his best friend, a math whiz, languishes as a waitress at a local pizza parlor because she's terrified of everything beyond her home town. When these misfits hear of a Chinese healer, they decide to find him, and they venture out in an old VW van. The heliophobe wraps himself in tin foil and the coward sticks to low-speed roads that appear "yellow" on the map, so that we can't miss the "Wizard of Oz" parallel. The novel succeeds as a quirky, affectionate satire of brand-saturated Britain, but its antic plot veers toward the cutesy, and the prose, deliberately—indeed, puritanically—banal, never lets the characters burst into Technicolor.
Copyright © 2005 The New Yorker

From Booklist

Slacker lit is so 1992--the year of Coupland's Generation X--but Thomas, a dewy talent much touted in the UK, gives smirking satire a warmer heart in this contemporary quest novel. Its twentysomethings languish in the suburban wastelands of Essex, engaging the world primarily through e-mail, the Internet, and American sitcoms and movies. Luke, at least, has an excuse for his narrow existence: he's allergic to sunshine and can't leave his bedroom. When a distant spiritual healer claims to have a cure, Luke and his friends set off on a road trip that symbolizes breaking free, taking risks, living. The theme of self-discovery weighs a bit heavily, as does the Wizard of Oz framework (Luke wears a tinfoil suit; his best friend, Julie, is a clinical coward; and they're all off to see the guru). Gen Xers will probably skip this nostalgia trip, but members of Gen Y are likely to embrace the pop-culture references and the characters' rambling conversations on everything from crap jobs to New Age lifestyles to imaginary numbers. Jennifer Mattson
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 368 pages
• Publisher: Anchor (June 8, 2004)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1400075319
• ISBN-13: 978-1400075317
• Product Dimensions: 5.1 x 0.8 x 8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,203,456 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Scarlett Thomas was born in London in 1972. Her other novels include Bright Young Things, Going Out, PopCo and The End of Mr.Y, which was longlisted for the Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction 2007. She teaches creative writing at the University of Kent.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars A gentle coming-of-age story, December 1, 2007

By 

Peter Fletcher - See all my reviews

This review is from: Going Out (Paperback)

I first discovered Scarlett Thomas when I read "The End of Mr Y", which has to be my favorite novel of the last five years. I've been working my way through everything she's written, and "Going Out" is number three for me. It's a very pleasant read, with a small dose of the kind of wacky existential philosophy which made Mr. Y such a good read, and plenty of well-observed characters from unfashionable Essex who I'm sure are very close to Ms Thomas's heart.

I find her novels to be deliciously escapist, and full of pop-culture references: who on the internet could forget that "The Dark Side Of The Moon" makes such a good alternative soundtrack for "The Wizard of Oz"?

I'd recommend any of her novels, even those I've not read yet ...

5 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Yellow Roads, June 29, 2004

By 

"stephcandance" (Atlanta) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Going Out (Paperback)

Contrary to the editorial review, I'm a "Gen Xer" and very much appreciated this book's nostalgia. The story is as unrealistic as they come, but quite entertaining. Thomas did a fine job with the characters. And the Wizard of Oz touch was very charming.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Cute story, likable characters, March 4, 2008

By 

Scarlett Brontė (Portland, Oregon) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Going Out (Paperback)

Likeable, quirky, twenty-something, English characters trying to find their way, by deciding to go on a Wizard of Oz type quest.

Thomas writes odd and honest characters in a way that exposes truths about being human, while keeping the narrative light and fast paced.

I read her book Popco, too and will check out whatever else she writes.