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Title details for True Failure by Alex Higley - Wait list

True Failure

by Alex Higley
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A twisting examination of life under late capitalism and the deceptions we inhabit to invent our own success stories.
Ben just lost his job, but he won't fess up to his wife Tara. Instead, while he claims to be going to work, he's actually devoting his time to auditioning for the wildly popular reality TV show Big Shot, where he'll be able to pitch his unique entrepreneurial idea. Meanwhile, Tara is lying to the parents of the children at her day care, turning in fabricated accounts of the kids' daily activities. And Marcy, the producer of Big Shot, has told her coworkers she's taking some time to "unplug," the better to avoid explaining her real reasons for getting away from the office . . .
Lies are the air True Failure's characters breathe: lies to themselves and lies to others, lies that comfort and confound. In this extraordinary novel, worthy of a place alongside the work of Joy Williams and Charles Portis, Alex Higley pokes a hole in the greatest and most perfidious lie of our time—that we are all either successes or failures in life—with warmth, wit, and wounding observation.

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Release date

    February 25, 2025

  • Formats

    • Kindle Book

    • OverDrive Read

      • ISBN: 9781566897143

    • EPUB ebook

      • ISBN: 9781566897143
      • File size: 1775 KB

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • Booklist

      December 1, 2024
      If all fiction is based on secrets and lies, this caustically comic novel by Higley (Old Open, 2017) takes that theme to a new level. In suburban Chicago, accountant Ben conceals his recent firing from his wife, Tara, while frantically attempting to get booked on the Shark Tank-esque show Big Shot--despite the fact that he has no idea to pitch. Tara, meanwhile, hasn't told Ben that she was pregnant and had a miscarriage and spends her time making fictional logs of her day care charges' activities for the children's parents. In L.A., Big Shot producer Marcy attempts to parlay Ben's presence on the show into a disaster that will end in her leaving the show to pursue a filmmaking career, while her intern Callie pretends to be keeping tabs on an imprisoned killer that Marcy fears. When these characters and their deceits and expectations collide, the result is even more dramatically bizarre than readers may expect. Higley's parade of wisecracks and sitcom-y scenes doesn't quite undermine his persistent affection for his characters and their misbegotten dreams.

      COPYRIGHT(2024) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Formats

  • Kindle Book
  • OverDrive Read
  • EPUB ebook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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