Author:Tim Parks
Discover Tim Parks’ darkly funny and deeply prescient Booker prize-shortlisted novel about the European experience.
A brilliantly comic and dyspeptic novel about an obsessive love gone sour. Europa follows Jerry Marlow, a middle-aged Brit teaching at an Italian university, as he and his colleagues embark on a coach trip to Strasbourg in order to petition the European Parliament for improved working conditions.
Jealousy and revenge, passion and dread intertwine in one man's soul as he's trapped in the awful claustrophobia of the trip with a group of people he loathes - and the woman who broke his heart.
‘The best thing about Europa is the voice Tim Parks conjures up: Marlow's wry, defeated reason keeps you turning the pages...reminding us that it is far easier to unite a sprawling continent than the few cubic metres that contain a human soul’ Sunday Times
Europa is a full and rounded and very disturbing novel…guaranteed to intrigue and, more often than not, have you squirming and wincing.
—— The TimesSheer enjoyment... Doffing his hat to Joyce and Beckett, Parks really hits his stride
—— Mail on SundayThe best thing about Europa is the voice Tim Parks conjures up: Marlow's wry, defeated reason keeps you turning the pages... A forlorn but seductive voice, reminding us that it is far easier to unite a sprawling continent than the few cubic metres that contain a human soul
—— Sunday TimesThe triumph of the work is its discomforting portrayal of an agile mind hampered by the twin shackles of longing and disgust... Europa is that rare beast, a book which demands and withstands a second reading
—— Daily TelegraphA brilliant journalistic investigation... A copy should be sent to every Labour MP to remind them of their responsibilities
—— Robert McCrum , Observer'This is a dirty book'
—— The Times Literary Supplement'Fine comic scenes...readers will have trouble putting Sap Rising down, even if their gorge rises'
—— Daily Express'Imagine Barbara Pym writing for Penthouse'
—— Literary Review'He writes so brilliantly'
—— Daniel Farson , Evening Standard'Extremely funny'
—— Time Out'Do not buy this book'
—— Guardian'Frightful pile of garbage'
—— New Statesman