A hugely inventive, hugely readable novel about two young people with Multiple Personality Disorder. 'A gripping novel of suspense that could have come from the pen of Stephen King at his best.' Daily Telegraph 'Mouse is lying in a strange bed, in a strange house, with her hand pressed between the thighs of a man she has never seen before...She doesn't scream. She wants to, but a lifetime of losing time -- and covering up the fact -- has left her skilled at controlling her reactions. She screams inside.' Penny Driver -- 'Mouse' -- suffers from Multiple Personality Disorder, blacking out whenever one of her other personalities takes control of her mind and body. So when Penny discovers that her new colleague Andrew Gage also suffers from MPD, she asks for his help. Through therapy, Andrew's personalities have long since learnt to co-exist in harmony in an imaginary house inside his head, but Andrew's 'house' is not quite so ordered as he would like to believe. In helping Penny, he discovers a locked door under the stairs, deep in his unconscious -- a door that hides the dark secret as to why Andrew's childhood mind shattered in the first place...
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'A good old-fashioned crime novel, as readable as the most golden of golden age mysteries.' New Statesman 'Exceptional... Reading those first pages, you feel real excitement: the thump in head and heart of a captivating idea; the creepiness of a fairytale; the wonderment of coming across something which feels both original and authoritatively imagined.' Daily Telegraph 'A stunning, thrilling, deeply moving work of fiction.' PETER STRAUB, co-author of Black House 'Irresistible... utterly convincing... an odyssey of transformation and trust.' New York Times 'A stunning feat of literary craftsmanship, gripping for all of its 479 pages... Set This House in Order is pure fiction at its best.' San Francisco Chronicle 'A shockingly likable suspense story, not so much a whodunit as a whoisit... Extraordinary.' Boston Globe 'Ruff makes us care about the choices these characters make - which is the point of all stories.' Time Out '479 pages of compulsive pleasure... a novel that's cleverly conceived, beautifully written and consistently riveting.' Metro (London) 'If the Tourette's Syndrome-afflicted protagonist of Jonathan Lethem's Motherless Brooklyn seemed a stunning literary trick to pull off, try Matt Ruff's pair of Multiple Personality Disorder casualties... So beautifully characterised are the voices that the reader is never confused... To quote Thomas Pynchon: "dizzyingly readable".' Uncut 'An utterly engrossing thriller... both a triumph and a delight.' Zembla magazine 'An unusual, thoughtful psychological thriller, by turns comic, bizarre and tragic.' Jack magazine 'A moving, ambitious work... Similar to Christopher Nolan's film Memento, Andrew and Mouse's confusion and ignorance about their past is keenly conveyed. Each time the reader is lulled into a false sense of security, a myriad of jolting plot revelations triggers a re-evaluation of the characters. Ruff's narrative superbly mirrors the protagonists' emotions, and his flair for character writing creates a suspenseful and enjoyable novel.' City Life 'Hard to put down. As with the Tourettic compulsions of Jonathan Lethem's Motherless Brooklyn, multiple personality allows Ruff to devise a beguiningly unusual stunt-narrator.' London Review of Books 'Stunning... The conclusion packs a wallop, but this is ultimately a romantic story, and so even the truth is delivered tenderly. Remarkably, Set This House in Order brings extraordinary warmth to the chilliest of childhoods.' Oprah Magazine
About the Author
matt ruff is the author of Sewer, Gas & Electric and Fool on the Hill. He is married and lives in Seattle, Washington.
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3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Matt Ruff's Best Novel To Date,
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This review is from: Set This House in Order (Paperback)
"Set This House In Order" is Matt Ruff's finest work of fiction to date, brilliantly adding to a splendid body of work that includes such classics as his literary debut "Fool On The Hill" and the Ayn Rand-influenced cyberpunk novel "Sewer, Gas, Electric: The Public Works Trilogy". He offers a fascinating twist on the coming-of-age tale, exploring the lives of the multiple personalities inhabiting the bodies of Andrew Gage and Penny Driver. Like Jonathan Lethem in "Motherless Brooklyn", Ruff writes eloquently and with much compassion about two characters afflicted with a severe personality disorder. None of his splendid prose lapses into cliche or melodramatic writing. It's one of the few books I have read lately that I found almost impossible to put down, compelled to read vast portions of the novel at one clip. Without a doubt, Matt Ruff has become the most distinguished writer ever to have graduated from New York City's prestigious Stuyvesant High School. He is also among my generation's most talented writers, comparable in quality to the likes of Jonathan Lethem, Jeffrey Eugenides and Michael Chabon.
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