- Paperback: 256 pages
- Publisher: McClelland & Stewart (Oct 23 2001)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0771045905
- ISBN-13: 978-0771045905
- Product Dimensions: 19.6 x 13 x 1.8 cm
- Shipping Weight: 272 g
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #582,663 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
Product Description
One warm July morning, Mr. Phillips climbs out of bed and prepares for his commute to London – but this is no ordinary day. Though he carries his attaché case as usual as he sets out from home, he does not head for the office. Instead, this is a day on which Mr. Phillips will chat with a pornographer, stalk a TV mini-celebrity, have lunch with an aspiring record mogul, and get caught up in a bank robbery. In short, as Mr. Phillips comes to realize, this is the first day of the rest of his life – whether he wants it to be or not.
But why is Mr. Phillips, a cautious middle-aged accountant, not behind his desk calculating the financial consequences of redundancies or recommending the savings to be made from more responsible use of yellow sticky notes?
In Mr. Phillips, John Lanchester has created an unforgettable character – the quintessential average man whose tidy life is one day shaken up by an event even he can’t talk about. Lanchester’s eye for detail is unparalleled, his sensibility all his own. This new novel confirms his reputation as one of the most innovative and gifted novelists writing today.
From the Hardcover edition.
But why is Mr. Phillips, a cautious middle-aged accountant, not behind his desk calculating the financial consequences of redundancies or recommending the savings to be made from more responsible use of yellow sticky notes?
In Mr. Phillips, John Lanchester has created an unforgettable character – the quintessential average man whose tidy life is one day shaken up by an event even he can’t talk about. Lanchester’s eye for detail is unparalleled, his sensibility all his own. This new novel confirms his reputation as one of the most innovative and gifted novelists writing today.
From the Hardcover edition.
About the Author
John Lanchester was born in Hamburg in 1962. He was brought up in the Far East and educated in England. He is a columnist for the Daily Telegraph and is on the editorial board of the London Review of Books. The Debt to Pleasure (1996), won the Whitbread First Novel Award, the Betty Trask Prize, the Hawthornden Prize, and a Julia Child Award. His second novel, Mr. Phillips, was published in 2000. His most recent novel is Fragrant Harbour. He lives in London.
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Customer Reviews
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
4.1 out of 5 stars (30 customer reviews)
17 of 18 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
A Great, Once-in-a-Decade Novel, July 21 2000
By A Customer - Published on Amazon.com
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Mr. Phillips: A Novel (Hardcover)
MR. PHILLIPS is a recent inductee into my personal Pantheon of great modern literature. This is a terrific - indeed, incandescent - little book about a single day in the life of a very ordinary middle-class Englishman who has just lost his job and hasn't yet broken the news to his family. There's nothing, and yet everything to this seemingly inconsequential work. It reminds us, again, that even at its bleakest, life is more comedy than tragedy. As a writer, Lanchester is, in the English way, a precisionist. Most of his conceits are so economic, sharp, original and outrageous that you read the entire book (it can be done in a few hours) shivering with pleasure and wishing that you yourself were half as talented.
15 of 16 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Seven Stars! : Funnier than "Catch 22", April 16 2000
By Chuck Phillips - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Mr. Phillips: A Novel (Hardcover)
"Mr. Phillips" has achieved the impossible: one-upping the most intelligent/hilarious book ever written: Joe Heller's "Catch 22". The "Minutes of the Wellesley Crescent Watch Comittee meeting" almost put me in the hospital. I was in laugh pain on every subsequent page. I was attracted to the book principally because of the title (being a Mr. Phillips myself, I thought it would look spiffy on my coffee table). Knew nothing about the writer. Never heard of the book. This was blind luck at its best. I now read excerpts aloud (to everone's delight) at work and dinner parties. I've become a John Lanchester evangalist. I hope he writes a lot more stuff. Makes me proud to be a "Mr. Phillips." Bravo.
10 of 10 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
Thoroughly Modern Mitty, April 13 2000
By A Customer - Published on Amazon.com
This review is from: Mr. Phillips: A Novel (Hardcover)
Mr. Phillips chronicles the first day of unemployment for aredundant accountant in London. No one knows he is out of work; hegets up and goes into town, as he normally would. The fortunate reader gets to occupy the imagination of this middle aged ex-accountant as he ponders on sex, family, city life, and death. John Lanchester 's writing is droll and at times will make you laugh out loud. But there is a deeper story in this novel which will move the reader to a feeling of satisfaction and delight at the end of Mr. Phillip's day. Mr. Phillips remains with the reader long after the last page is read. A well written and entertaining novel.
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