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A Guide to Animal Behaviour
Shortlisted for the Governor General's Award for Fiction A Guide to Animal Behaviour is a stunning collection of stories by an author who is fast becoming one of the great, innovative story writers of his generation. Following on the heels of his widely acclaimed comic novel, The South Will Rise at Noon , Douglas Glover's new collection smashes all the fictional moulds. Urbane, stylish, and off-beat, the stories in this collection touch the lives of an astonishing array of characters whose common experience is of a world that is wayward yet full of a born-again Christian from Kentucky who loses his memory and ends up finding true love in glitzy Bel Air; two women who fall in love only to be parted when one dies of cancer; a man who goes to live in a cardboard box when his wife leaves him for the manager of a Toys R Us store; an eighteenth-century Canadian pioneer who believes he is being persecuted by witches. This is sophisticated fiction at its best. A maximalist writer of ideas, he packs his sentences with energy, exuberant imagery and amazing turns of thoughts.
189 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1991
1 person is currently reading
39 people want to read
About the author
Douglas Glover
47Ìýbooks29Ìýfollowers Douglas Glover worked in the newsrooms of daily papers in Saskatchewan, New Brunswick, Ontario, and Quebec, before publishing Precious in 1984. His byline later appeared in the book pages of The New York Times, The Globe and Mail, The Washington Post, The Chicago Tribune, and The Boston Globe.
He is the author of two works of literary criticism, including The Enamoured Knight, a recent book on Don Quixote, and nine books of fiction, including 16 Categories of Desire, A Guide to Animal Behaviour, The Life and Times of Captain N., and the best-selling historical novel Elle, winner of the 2003 Governor General's Award for Fiction.
Elle was also a finalist for the Commonwealth Writers Prize and was on the short list of finalists for the 2005 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. The book is now available in a new, reader's guide edition. Born and raised in southwestern Ontario, Douglas Glover now lives near Saratoga Springs, New York.
He is the author of two works of literary criticism, including The Enamoured Knight, a recent book on Don Quixote, and nine books of fiction, including 16 Categories of Desire, A Guide to Animal Behaviour, The Life and Times of Captain N., and the best-selling historical novel Elle, winner of the 2003 Governor General's Award for Fiction.
Elle was also a finalist for the Commonwealth Writers Prize and was on the short list of finalists for the 2005 International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. The book is now available in a new, reader's guide edition. Born and raised in southwestern Ontario, Douglas Glover now lives near Saratoga Springs, New York.
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
June 5, 2007
Chris, I am really adding this book for you because I think you'd like it. Glover was my advisor for most of my MFA program, and I just love his work. He's terribly witty (and a hugely smart man), he uses sly repetitions on the page, and on the whole, this collection is spare and an easy read. Chris, I think you'd enjoy Glover's almost sick sense of humor at times (I do!). Check out "Why I Decide to Kill Myself and Other Jokes," "A Man in a Box," and "Woman Gored by Bison Lives."
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October 18, 2020#7
I knew at once that the red-haired woman and her minions, the synecdochic Lance and the S-Gs, were at the bottom of this. It wouldn’t have surprised me to discover that the S-Gs had been secreting vast amounts of dark matter in that box next door to mine (suspicious coughs, amorous noises, cries of joy).
I left the library vindicated and went over to the mission for a shower, but was not allowed inside.
#10
Nights he and I go to La Fonda to listen to a Panamanian salsa band and dance with the Spanish stenographers. (Two of the musicians are ex-priests and gay � they tell of a huge monastery in the mountains where bent priests from all over the country go to be purified or hidden; the drunk priests, mad priests, promiscuous, gay and pederastic priests, the sinful men of God � I don’t know if this is true.)
#11
It is difficult to describe precise states of mind. My style of abandonment is sentimental and hopeless. Sex is only a variant of nostalgia. I am so unhappy with Danny. I feel a quiver between my legs; I want something from Susan, something no one can give, want only perhaps that the afternoon will go on and on.
I knew at once that the red-haired woman and her minions, the synecdochic Lance and the S-Gs, were at the bottom of this. It wouldn’t have surprised me to discover that the S-Gs had been secreting vast amounts of dark matter in that box next door to mine (suspicious coughs, amorous noises, cries of joy).
I left the library vindicated and went over to the mission for a shower, but was not allowed inside.
#10
Nights he and I go to La Fonda to listen to a Panamanian salsa band and dance with the Spanish stenographers. (Two of the musicians are ex-priests and gay � they tell of a huge monastery in the mountains where bent priests from all over the country go to be purified or hidden; the drunk priests, mad priests, promiscuous, gay and pederastic priests, the sinful men of God � I don’t know if this is true.)
#11
It is difficult to describe precise states of mind. My style of abandonment is sentimental and hopeless. Sex is only a variant of nostalgia. I am so unhappy with Danny. I feel a quiver between my legs; I want something from Susan, something no one can give, want only perhaps that the afternoon will go on and on.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
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