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    The Fall Guy: A Novel
    The Fall Guy: A Novel
    The Fall Guy: A Novel
    Audiobook6 hours

    The Fall Guy: A Novel

    Written by James Lasdun

    Narrated by Charles Constant

    3/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    It is summer, 2012. Charlie, a wealthy banker with an uneasy conscience, invites his troubled cousin Matthew to visit him and his wife in their idyllic mountaintop house. As the days grow hotter, the friendship between the three begins to reveal its fault lines, and with the arrival of a fourth character, the household finds itself suddenly in the grip of uncontrollable passions. As readers of James Lasdun's acclaimed fiction can expect, The Fall Guy is a complex moral tale as well as a gripping suspense story, probing questions of guilt and betrayal with ruthless incisiveness. Who is the real victim here? Who is the perpetrator? And who, ultimately, is the fall guy? Darkly vivid, with an atmosphere of erotic danger, The Fall Guy is Lasdun's most entertaining novel yet.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHighbridge Company
    Release dateOct 18, 2016
    ISBN9781681682457
    The Fall Guy: A Novel
    Author

    James Lasdun

    James Lasdun was born in London and now lives in upstate New York. He has published two novels, as well as several collections of short stories and poetry. He has been long-listed for the Man Booker Prize and shortlisted for the Los Angeles Times, T. S. Eliot, and Forward prizes in poetry, and he was the winner of the inaugural BBC National Short Story Award. His nonfiction has been published in Harper's Magazine, Granta, and the London Review of Books.

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    Reviews for The Fall Guy

    3/5

    70 ratings3 reviews

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    • 2/5
      Disappointing. Like another reviewer, I chose this as my book from the Book of the Month club, where it was pitched as a psychological thriller. Their usually excellent recommendations fell flat with this pick, as I kept waiting for the “slow build” to actual start for nearly 200 pages.When I think psychological thriller, I think Gone Girl, or even The Girl on the Train. Things that make the reader question what is happening and what is real. The only one who didn’t know what was real in this book was the main character, and his confusion about relationships and circumstances was anything but thrilling. Throw in some unnecessary and tiresome talk about banking and the Occupy movement and you’re really left scratching your head at the end.I think this book could be enjoyable if it was read not as a psychological thriller, but as a character study on a man prone to obsession. Obsession with cooking, obsession with his cousin’s wife, obsession with the other character that comes into the story because of the cousin’s wife. The writing style is enjoyable, and it is a quick read, but going in with certain expectations that are never met makes it disappointing.
    • 4/5
      Well, this was just a lot of fun. James Lasdun's newest book is a suspenseful novel that rushes along until it ends at just the right moment (so hard for authors to get this exactly right). The Fall Guy is Matthew, a chef trying to decide what to do with his life. His cousin Charlie has invited him to spend the summer with him and his wife at their vacation home in an affluent area of upstate New York. Matthew and Charlie have a long history together and Matthew also gets along well with Charlie's wife, Chloe. Sub-letting his apartment and moving into the guest house is a perfect way to give Matthew a financial break and time to think over what he wants to do with his life. The peaceful summer he'd pictured is altered when Matthew begins to suspect that Chloe is having an affair and his curiosity and concern begins to take an ominous turn, even as Charlie and Chloe seem to be losing their affection for him. Told from only Matthew's point of view, The Fall Guy has an anxious and claustrophobic feel to it. The reader begins to suspect that how Matthew sees things may not be the way the others affected see things and the inability to step away from Matthew's brain adds to the tension as it becomes clearer and clearer that things are going very badly wrong. James Lasdun may be known for his more literary work, but he knows how to craft a fast-paced and entertaining novel. I thoroughly enjoyed it.
    • 4/5
      Wealthy Charlie and Chloe have invited Charlie’s cousin Matthew, a struggling chef, to stay with them in their luxurious home for the summer. Matthew stays in the guest cottage and dreams of perhaps one day living there as caretaker of the home. He steps in as chef for the three of them and cooks enticing meals and they spend their days lounging by the pool or playing Scrabble. But tensions, suspicions and jealousy slowly escalate and the cracks in their relationship begin to appear.Saying anything more plot wise would go into spoiler territory. As for the writing, there were a few things that weren’t really credible and I kept thinking “Why doesn’t he just…?” But I had such a good time with this book and the world around me was completely lost the whole time I read. It certainly kept me riveted to the pages enjoying the whole experience. I was sure it was taking me in one direction when it never did so I was kept in suspense as to what would happen. The author has created a chilling, sinister, erotic atmosphere that was very entertaining. He truly knows how to tell a story and I’ll be checking out his other books soon. Highly recommended.This book was given to me by the publisher through Edelweiss in return for an honest review.