End of the World Blues
A Novel
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- $6.99
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- $6.99
Publisher Description
From Jon Courtenay Grimwood, author of the celebrated Arabesk series, comes a stunningly inventive novel of futuristic noir set in a world of shifting realities. Here a man is drawn into a gritty postmodern subculture and a secret kingdom of otherworldly beings to find what he lost long ago: a reason to live.
Kit Nouveau figured he’d already come to the end of the world. An Iraqi war veteran, expatriate, and part owner of Pirate Mary’s, the best Irish bar in Tokyo, Kit had settled down to await the inevitable with barely a whimper. It wasn’t exactly how Kit thought he’d end up, and he was right.
It’s going to end up a lot worse.
A teenage runaway with fifteen million dollars in stolen cash and a taste for cosplay is about to save Kit’s life in a lethal swirl of scarlet and bridal lace. Lady Neku, a.k.a. Countess of High Strange, has her own dangerous destiny to fulfill and it’s mysteriously connected to Kit’s ravaged past. Now Kit’s only hope for redemption is to save an ex-girlfriend he tragically failed once before. But everyone says it’s already too late. And she’s left behind only one ominous clue: her suicide note.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Straightforward explanations and linear plotting are in short supply in this stand-alone novel; rather, Grimwood's latest tale reads as if Kurt Vonnegut were writing manga for the producers of Doctor Who. The story starts in near-future Tokyo, where expatriate soldier Kit Nouveau runs an Irish bar. A runaway teenage girl, Lady Neku, hides $15 million in a train station locker and then tidily kills a mugger to save Kit's life, and soon both are deeply enmeshed in multi-layered clan wars. Kit's involves a reputed yakuza syndicate, various British police and spy agencies and several of his past and present lovers. Neku's concerns the alternate reality where she's a semi-immortal princess and the incipient bride to the heir of a rival family. The connections between the two are often vague, but Grimwood (Stamping Butterflies) stabilizes the story with uniformly compelling characterizations and vivid settings. Genre fans may find the book difficult to label, but readers with flexible expectations will find it easy to enjoy.