JULIAN BARNES is the author of two previous story collections, Cross Channel and The Lemon Table, and fourteen other books. He was awarded the Man Booker Prize in 2011 for his novel The Sense of an Ending. He lives in London.
A NEW YORK TIMES EDITORS' CHOICE
“Vibrant. . . . Full of life and voice. . . . As Barnes fans know,
love itself is a lifeline for this playful, erudite writer.” —San
Francisco Chronicle
“A collection that shows a contemporary master working at the
height of his ability. . . . Pulse sneaks up on you, and by the
end, you cannot help but be moved.” —The Oregonian
“[Barnes is a] confident literary decathlete, proficient at
old-fashioned storytelling, dialogue-driven portraiture, postmodern
collage, political allegory and farce, [and the] ability to create
narratives with both surface brio and finely calibrated
philosophical subtexts.” —Michiko Kakutani, The New York Times
“Outrageously witty and suave. . . . Wry, urbane.” —The Washington
Post
“Barnes is among the most adventurous writers—in style, versatility
and narrative structure—of his Amis-McEwan-Hitchens generation.”
—The New York Times Book Review
“A moving and truth-telling work of fiction.” —The Boston Globe
“Of our leading novelists, Julian Barnes has one of the richest
historical imaginations. . . . His stories tend to be quietly
observational, rather traditional in manner, and his characters are
never tragic. They are inhabitants of a gray-scale world, plugging
on through life chastened by the experiences Barnes recounts, but
not devastated by them. That may be why we identify with them so
easily.” —The Los Angeles Times
“Full of the sidelong wit and intelligence that make the writer one
of our most consistently deft short-form stylists. . . . [A]
quietly remarkable, elegant book.” —The Telegraph (London)
“A book that is almost entirely masterly. . . . These stories are
acutely observational. They neither satirize the speakers, nor
celebrate them. They make art out of the quotidian details of
modern conversation—and they are very funny.” —The Denver Post
“A collection of stories that engages the reader’s intellect and
heart, the best of fiction’s traditional concerns.” —Pittsburgh
Post-Gazette
“In Pulse, Julian Barnes is as perceptive and intelligent as in any
other of his dazzling novels and nonfiction, and, it must be said,
fully as serious. . . . The reader appreciates Barnes’ unflinching
realism and his determination to boil life down to its essence,
however disconcerting that process may be.” —Providence Journal
“Sharply elegant, piercing investigations of relationships.”
—Vogue
“Barnes is a master at establishing the intimacies of mortality in
this kind of relationship, forever testing the limits to which our
faith in human connection might stretch.” —The Observer (London)
![]() |
Ask a Question About this Product More... |
![]() |