From the award-winning author and New Yorker contributor, a riveting novel about secrets and scandals, psychiatry and pulp fiction, inspired by the lives of H.P. Lovecraft and his circle.
Paul La Farge is the author of the novels The Artist of the Missing (1999), Haussmann, or the Distinction (2001), and Luminous Airplanes (2011), as well as The Facts of Winter (2005), a book of imaginary dreams. His stories and essays have appeared in The New Yorker, Harper's, The Believer, McSweeney's, Nautilus, Conjunctions and elsewhere. He has won the Bard Fiction Prize, two California Book Awards, and the Bay Area Book Critics' Award for fiction. In 2013-14 he was a fellow at the Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Center for Scholars and Writers at the New York Public Library. He has received fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, the Guggenheim Foundation, and the New York Foundation for the Arts.
"La Farge's fourth novel is a playfully disorienting tour through
the biography of the horror master H. P. Lovecraft, as well as a
portrait of a number of men, both fictional and real, who try to
decode his life and work...La Farge has great fun constructing
texts with contradictory information about the young man, the most
entertaining of which involves William S. Burroughs, the strangest
Lovecraftian of all."-- The New Yorker "I've always been too timid
to read H. P. Lovecraft novels and to experience the eldritch
wonders within, but I'm greatly enjoying Paul La Farge's new novel,
The Night Ocean, on Lovecraftian themes. Like Murakami, La Farge
keeps a foot in the familiar while leading you on his eerie
adventures." -Sarah Larson, The New Yorker "A beauty of a tale...A
book full of pleasures...Dashing, playful and cleverly imagined,
The Night Ocean emerges as an inexhaustible shaggy monster, part
literary parody, part case study of the slipperiness of narrative
and the seduction of a good story."-- D. T. Max, The New York Times
Book Review "A fascinating, labyrinthine story....La Farge treats
readers to two equally compelling and dubious stories....a reminder
that in spite of our best efforts, sometimes the truth really is
beyond our comprehension." --Boston Globe
"The plot unfolds like a series of Russian nesting dolls, and
thrillingly so: Like the best of Lovecraft, this novel questions
the capacity of language to describe reality with accuracy...The
Night Ocean proves to be more than a great read--it's a timely
meditation on the challenge of separating artist from art and the
limits of human understanding." --Chicago Review of Books "[La
Farge] carries it all off with breathtaking skill and
panache....[S]pare yourself the trouble of trying to divine what's
true and what's fiction in "The Night Ocean" and just go along for
the ride." -The Washington Post "A breathtaking novel inspired by
HP. .Lovecraft, this story takes fan fiction to new levels. It's
intricate, original, and a thrill of a read."-- Cosmopolitan (Best
New Books for Spring)
"La Farge's rabbit-hole mystery ranges from ancient cultures to
modern chat rooms, but hangs together in one woman's absorbing
voice." --New York Magazine, "8 New Books You Need to Read This
March" "A complicated and beautiful demonstration of people trying
to live and love in a world of unknowns....Powerful." --BOMB "With
this intoxicating trip into the twin worlds of imagination and
reality, La Farge gives new meaning to fan fiction in his
exploration of the world of H.P. Lovecraft and the legacy he left
behind." --Newsweek "This is a formally and emotionally limber
novel that pulls you in as a black lake might, except that it's
also funny, and transformative, and illuminating--it's a book of
spells if I've ever read one." -Lit Hub "[La Farge] has surpassed
himself. The Night Ocean is the ultimate crossing of the hazy
boundary between reality and fantasy....A mighty boon to horror
geeks like me who misspent a good portion of our youths reading the
pulp fiction of Lovecraft and his unholy minions." -BookPage
"What a great book...Highly recommended but be prepared." -The H.P.
Lovecraft Historical Society "Remarkable...The Night Ocean is a
fabulous novel, in the quite literal meaning of that: it's about
tricksters and literary hoaxes and secret identities, but it's
really about the fables we make to construct, or discover, or
invent ourselves, and about how much we can really get away with."
--Locus "This many-layered literary mystery is chockablock with
surprise appearances." --BBC.com, "Ten Books You Should Read in
March" "As we traverse a shifting narrative web that spans
continents, decades, and spiritual dimensions, La Farge's inventive
and absorbing fifth novel reveals that questions relating to love
and horror are not always mutually exclusive." --Chronogram "For a
novel about H.P. Lovecraft, The Night Ocean is surprisingly moving;
for a story about the recondite back alleys of science fiction, it
is surprisingly accessible; for a historical fiction, it is
surprisingly contemporary; and for a novel about the unknowable and
the mysterious, it is remarkably satisfying. The Night Ocean
deserves the highest praise."-- Tor.com
"The universe of The Night Ocean is vast....In a complex,
high-concept narrative littered with famous figures, La Farge
leaves readers ever uncertain as to who's telling the truth--and
ready for the next twist."
--Elle "Throughout, the novel wobbles between richly researched
historical fact... and brilliantly imagined fiction. It will escape
no reader that The Night Ocean is itself a work of passion,
wordsmithery, and obsession -- a kind of story within a story, if
you will, of the sort that Lovecraft would have, well, loved."
--The Week "Intricately constructed...His sure-handed
world-building [and] empathy...suggest a circle of La Fargeans will
someday soon emerge."
--Albert Mobilio, Bookforum "Was H.P. Lovecraft, the great American
horror writer, gay? That's the question at the start of this
ingenious, provocative work of alternative history from La Farge
...Like Lovecraft's 'The Call of Cthulhu, ' the novel consists of
several sub-narratives, ranging widely in time and place. But
instead of a revelation about humanity's diminished place in an
impersonal universe, La Farge delivers insights into the human need
to believe in stories and the nature of literary fame, while
consistently upsetting readers' expectations....[H]e outdoes his
predecessors with this crafty mix of love, sex, and lies."
--Publishers Weekly, (starred review) "The breadth of La Farge's
research and the specificity of his historical details are
impressive: we enter the worlds of science-fiction fandom, internet
trolls, literary hoaxes, and ancient Mexican civilizations as [he]
deftly weaves in famous figures like H.P Lovecraft, Isaac Asimov,
and William S. Burroughs. Only a virtuoso could pull off a story so
intricately plotted and so full of big ideas about morality and
truth...La Farge is this virtuoso, folding stories inside stories
with ease.... An effortlessly memorable novel."
--Kirkus Reviews (starred review) "Magnificent. The Night Ocean is
an impossible, irresistible novel, a love letter to the unloveable
that speaks the unspeakable."
- Lev Grossman, author of the Magicians trilogy "A whole damned
hustling heart-broken double-talking meaning-haunted world it is a
privilege to enter."
- Peter Straub "Paul La Farge has crafted the perfect novel - a
work that constantly twists into unexpected realms, that
illuminates the nature of love and deception, and that is as funny
as it is profound. The Night Ocean is a gift to readers."
- David Grann, author of The Lost City of Z "The Night Ocean had me
from the first sentence. This immensely original, elegantly written
and continually surprising novel casts a spell that keeps us
enthralled until the book's brilliant conclusion."
- Francine Prose, author of Lovers at the Chameleon Club, Paris
1932
"The best novel of the year, almost any year. Historical,
hysterical, fanatically attuned to the nuances of language and
character, its mission, in its own words, is to 'begin the almost
impossible work of loving the world.' It succeeds and then some,
but it does more than that. It opens the window and airs out our
stuffy literature. It is a book of light and laughter."
- Gary Shteyngart, author of Super Sad True Love Story
"The Night Ocean is straight up brilliant. That's no surprise since
it's written by Paul La Farge, one of the smartest, wildest
literary talents in the game today....A sly, witty, but still
loving send-up of H.P. Lovecraft and some of the grand anxieties of
the American 20th century."
- Victor LaValle, author of The Ballad of Black Tom
"It has been years since I read a novel with so much joy,
impatience and awe. The Night Ocean overflows with difficult love,
not least of all that of our narrator, Marina, who indirectly
reminds us of how we are pushed around by dreams, ghosts, chance,
and history. I have long been a tremendous admirer of all of La
Farge's work; this novel is my favorite."
- Rivka Galchen, author of Atmospheric Disturbances
"This story delivers thrills, brews intrigue, and takes literature
on a wild ride. The Night Ocean is genuinely fantastic."
- Samantha Hunt, author of Mr. Splitfoot
"An electric exploration of horror, obsession, madness, and
mystery. A novel that tunnels deeper into the thorny caverns of the
human heart than most dare. To read The Night Ocean is to be
plunged under a scary smart, morally labyrinthine, and wickedly
funny spell. Paul La Farge is one of the most exciting writers
working today."
- Laura van den Berg, author of Find Me
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