by Richard Russo
|
by Lisa Moore
|
by Dionne Brand
|
by Jeanette Lynes
|
by Kyo Maclear
|
|
||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||
Customers Who Bought This Item Also Bought
Product Details
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
|
Product Description
Books in Canada
C. S. Richardson’s The End of the Alphabet is an elegant, shapely novel. As new novelist Richardson has an advantage. He is a book designer, and has probably read more novels (before he creates their covers) than most writers, so his standards are exacting, obvious in his own writing.
The End of the Alphabet is about Ambrose Zephyr, an absolutely average man who is content with the habit of his days. His only extraordinary aspect is his utter passion for his wife of some years, Zappora Ashkenazi, whom he calls Zipper. Zipper is elegant and distinctive, and Ambrose is besotted with her; even after years of marriage, he simply cannot understand what she sees in him.
When Ambrose fails his “annual medical exam” and is told by his doctor that he has only a month to live, he decides to contradict his impending death by embarking on a wild journey, an alphabetical “grand tour” of all the places on the globe that demand visiting. And thus begins a frantic odyssey, from Amsterdam to Berlin to Chartres to Paris to Florence and onwards, with Ambrose trying to outrun his limited time by gulping down all the sights of a bountiful world and its infinite variety.
Zipper travels with him, watching her husband’s physical erosion and struggling to negotiate her own pain and grief. Until gently, quietly, the two of them reach an understanding about love and mortality. Instead of going for the easy structure of the complete alphabet, Richardson interrupts their journey and they return to their London home to face together the final and most inevitable destination, death.
Richardson writes with a creamy economy that is nothing less than dazzling. His compelling use of image, his distinctive style, and his understated wit all make this a novel that stands out, a novel that beckons and rewards as few novels do. The End of the Alphabet undertakes a journey that is about writing and its destinations. Richardson knows exactly how the alphabet shapes words, not careless and scattered clumps, but precisely calibrated, a geography and progress that illuminates both meaning and understanding.
Aritha van Herk (Books in Canada)
The End of the Alphabet is about Ambrose Zephyr, an absolutely average man who is content with the habit of his days. His only extraordinary aspect is his utter passion for his wife of some years, Zappora Ashkenazi, whom he calls Zipper. Zipper is elegant and distinctive, and Ambrose is besotted with her; even after years of marriage, he simply cannot understand what she sees in him.
When Ambrose fails his “annual medical exam” and is told by his doctor that he has only a month to live, he decides to contradict his impending death by embarking on a wild journey, an alphabetical “grand tour” of all the places on the globe that demand visiting. And thus begins a frantic odyssey, from Amsterdam to Berlin to Chartres to Paris to Florence and onwards, with Ambrose trying to outrun his limited time by gulping down all the sights of a bountiful world and its infinite variety.
Zipper travels with him, watching her husband’s physical erosion and struggling to negotiate her own pain and grief. Until gently, quietly, the two of them reach an understanding about love and mortality. Instead of going for the easy structure of the complete alphabet, Richardson interrupts their journey and they return to their London home to face together the final and most inevitable destination, death.
Richardson writes with a creamy economy that is nothing less than dazzling. His compelling use of image, his distinctive style, and his understated wit all make this a novel that stands out, a novel that beckons and rewards as few novels do. The End of the Alphabet undertakes a journey that is about writing and its destinations. Richardson knows exactly how the alphabet shapes words, not careless and scattered clumps, but precisely calibrated, a geography and progress that illuminates both meaning and understanding.
Aritha van Herk (Books in Canada)
From Publishers Weekly
An abrupt death sentence given to a 50-year-old London ad exec forces an uneasy deliverance in Richardson's smartly setup, poignant tale. Given less than a month to live, Ambrose Zephyr, alphabet-obsessed since childhood, decides to spend out his last days traveling around the globe from A to Z. Ambrose and his wife, Zappora Ashkenazi (the couple is childless), begin in Amsterdam, viewing art by Velázquez and Rembrandt that has been significant to them in their loving marriage, and now looks wholly transformed. The two move between the sweet memories of past love and an unreal present, from Berlin to Chartres, the Great Pyramids of Khufu to Istanbul; when Ambrose begins to falter and they return home to their Kensington terrace flat. Reality and good manners demand that they inform their respective employers and friends of Ambrose's condition, while Zappora, a fashion editor attempting to keep a journal of the couple's last moments together, endures until the end. Richardson's tightly focused tale has panache, shadowed by a brooding suspense. (Aug.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an alternate Hardcover edition.
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
Browse and search another edition of this book.
Browse and search another edition of this book.
Suggested Tags from Similar Products(What's this?)Be the first one to add a relevant tag (keyword that's strongly related to this product)
|
What do customers ultimately buy after viewing this item?
 |
87% buy the item featured on this page: The End of the Alphabet |
 |
5% buy The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society CDN$ 11.55 |
 |
3% buy The Book Thief CDN$ 11.67 |
 |
2% buy The Time Traveler's Wife CDN$ 11.00 |
Customer Reviews
|
Share your thoughts with other customers:
|
|||||||||||||
Most helpful customer reviews
Share your thoughts with other customers: Create your own review
|
Most recent customer reviews |
Listmania!
|
|
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
Your Recent History
(What's this?)|
After viewing product detail pages or search results, look here to find an easy way to navigate back to pages you are interested in. |
