A freaky tale of isolation and the porous membranes between us, Rebecca Gisler’s slim novel renders a collapsing world with equal parts aversion, fascination, and tenderness—for readers of Ottessa Moshfegh and Sayaka Murata.
At a time when she’d rather be making her own way in the world, an unnamed young woman finds herself moving to a small town at the seaside to care for her uncle. He’s a disabled veteran with questionable habits, prone to drinking, gorging, and hoarding—not to mention the occasional excursion down into the plumbing, where he might disappear for days at a time. When the world begins to shut down, Uncle and his niece are forced even closer still. She knows his every move—every bathroom break he takes, every pill he swallows—and she finds herself relying on this man who is the last one person occupying an empty world with her. But then Uncle’s health takes a final turn for the worse, he’s sent to a hospital that cares for cats, dogs, and Uncles, and any way for her to make sense of this eerie new reality, and her place in it, falls apart.
Poet-novelist Rebecca Gisler’s debut novel, set against our increasingly disjointed world, welcomes readers into a home of shut-ins as cozy as it is claustrophobic. Gisler’s bright, winding prose, masterfully translated from French by Jordan Stump, offers a rare witness to the complex ways in which we order our lives, for better or worse, inside and out.
Genre: Literary Fiction
At a time when she’d rather be making her own way in the world, an unnamed young woman finds herself moving to a small town at the seaside to care for her uncle. He’s a disabled veteran with questionable habits, prone to drinking, gorging, and hoarding—not to mention the occasional excursion down into the plumbing, where he might disappear for days at a time. When the world begins to shut down, Uncle and his niece are forced even closer still. She knows his every move—every bathroom break he takes, every pill he swallows—and she finds herself relying on this man who is the last one person occupying an empty world with her. But then Uncle’s health takes a final turn for the worse, he’s sent to a hospital that cares for cats, dogs, and Uncles, and any way for her to make sense of this eerie new reality, and her place in it, falls apart.
Poet-novelist Rebecca Gisler’s debut novel, set against our increasingly disjointed world, welcomes readers into a home of shut-ins as cozy as it is claustrophobic. Gisler’s bright, winding prose, masterfully translated from French by Jordan Stump, offers a rare witness to the complex ways in which we order our lives, for better or worse, inside and out.
Genre: Literary Fiction
Praise for this book
"Wry and funny and rich in strange new forms of discomfort, About Uncle is a slim volume that cuts deep, revealing the soft ligaments of family relations and letting them gleam under the light." - Alexandra Kleeman
"Disquieting, tender, painfully precise, the language of Gisler is a language of embodiment. To read Uncle is to become him." - Molly McGhee
"Disquieting, tender, painfully precise, the language of Gisler is a language of embodiment. To read Uncle is to become him." - Molly McGhee
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