2014-11-20
A rage-fueled gym rat enters into an abusive, symbiotic relationship with an overweight artist in a brash, decidedly Welsh-ian study of body image and media. Scottish cult legend Welsh (Skagboys, 2012, etc.) takes a detour to Miami Beach for this novel, in which lead narrator Lucy puts her well-machined physique to good use early, stopping a gunman taking aim at two guys on a highway. A witness, Lena, records the incident, making Lucy into a momentary celebrity. But Lucy's dreams of parlaying her semifame into a Biggest Loser-style reality show die quickly: The gunman turns out to have been aiming at alleged pedophiles, complicating the media narrative, and Lucy's adrenalized demeanor alienates her would-be TV partners. Lucy does everything in a fury, from emails to back-alley sex with men and women she picks up in clubs, suggesting that the friendship she starts with Lena won't go well. Indeed, it goes badly in a humanity-at-its-worst kind of way. What begins as Lucy's boot-camp-style fitness plan for Lena, a brilliant artist unlucky in love, turns into a captivity tale that explores the body and our obsession with others to a disarming, at times grotesque degree. (The title refers to a subplot involving a media circus about conjoined twins.) Welsh writes intelligently in two registers—blown-gasket Lucy and subdued, self-pitying Lena—and he uses those differing tones to ingeniously explore how self-image influences our perceptions of others. The flaw is that the novel's opening sense of emotional subtlety with both characters degrades into something more farcical, as the women become more blunt representations of fat vs. thin, punctuated with Grand Guignol splashes. Welsh isn't given to hollow provocation, but the depth of his social critique is undermined by his more absurd plot turns. A sometimes pleasurably over-the-top, sometimes simplistic proof that physical and mental health aren't always intertwined.
The famed-some would say notorious-author of*Trainspotting*and many other brilliant offenses against common literary decency comes at last to America, with a dark and twisted tale of personal training and abject codependency in the fading glitter of Miami's South Beach, with a novel that asks the provocative question: Why*would*you want to be "the Biggest Loser" anyway?
*****When Lucy Brennan, a Miami Beach personal-fitness trainer, disarms an apparently crazed gunman chasing two frightened homeless men along a deserted causeway at night, the police and the breaking-news cameras are not far behind. Within hours, Lucy becomes a hero. Her celebrity is short-lived, though: the "crazed gunman," turns out to be a victim of child sexual abuse and the two men are serial pedophiles.
*****The solitary eye-witness, the depressed and overweight Lena Sorenson, thrilled by Lucy's heroism and decisiveness, becomes obsessed with the trainer and enrolls as a client at her Bodysculpt gym. It quickly becomes clear that Lena is more interested in Lucy's body than her own. Then, when one of the pedophiles she allowed to escape carries out a heinous sex attack, Lucy's transition from hero to villain is complete. When Lucy imprisons Lena, and can't stop thinking about the sex lives of Siamese twins, the real problems start. In Lucy and Lena, Irvine Welsh has created two of his most memorable female protagonists, and one of the most bizarre, sadomasochistic folie à deux in contemporary fiction.*The Sex Lives of Siamese Twins*taps into two great obsessions of our time-how we look and where we live-and tells a story so subversive and dark it blacks out the Florida sun.
1119611929
*****When Lucy Brennan, a Miami Beach personal-fitness trainer, disarms an apparently crazed gunman chasing two frightened homeless men along a deserted causeway at night, the police and the breaking-news cameras are not far behind. Within hours, Lucy becomes a hero. Her celebrity is short-lived, though: the "crazed gunman," turns out to be a victim of child sexual abuse and the two men are serial pedophiles.
*****The solitary eye-witness, the depressed and overweight Lena Sorenson, thrilled by Lucy's heroism and decisiveness, becomes obsessed with the trainer and enrolls as a client at her Bodysculpt gym. It quickly becomes clear that Lena is more interested in Lucy's body than her own. Then, when one of the pedophiles she allowed to escape carries out a heinous sex attack, Lucy's transition from hero to villain is complete. When Lucy imprisons Lena, and can't stop thinking about the sex lives of Siamese twins, the real problems start. In Lucy and Lena, Irvine Welsh has created two of his most memorable female protagonists, and one of the most bizarre, sadomasochistic folie à deux in contemporary fiction.*The Sex Lives of Siamese Twins*taps into two great obsessions of our time-how we look and where we live-and tells a story so subversive and dark it blacks out the Florida sun.
The Sex Lives of Siamese Twins: A Novel
The famed-some would say notorious-author of*Trainspotting*and many other brilliant offenses against common literary decency comes at last to America, with a dark and twisted tale of personal training and abject codependency in the fading glitter of Miami's South Beach, with a novel that asks the provocative question: Why*would*you want to be "the Biggest Loser" anyway?
*****When Lucy Brennan, a Miami Beach personal-fitness trainer, disarms an apparently crazed gunman chasing two frightened homeless men along a deserted causeway at night, the police and the breaking-news cameras are not far behind. Within hours, Lucy becomes a hero. Her celebrity is short-lived, though: the "crazed gunman," turns out to be a victim of child sexual abuse and the two men are serial pedophiles.
*****The solitary eye-witness, the depressed and overweight Lena Sorenson, thrilled by Lucy's heroism and decisiveness, becomes obsessed with the trainer and enrolls as a client at her Bodysculpt gym. It quickly becomes clear that Lena is more interested in Lucy's body than her own. Then, when one of the pedophiles she allowed to escape carries out a heinous sex attack, Lucy's transition from hero to villain is complete. When Lucy imprisons Lena, and can't stop thinking about the sex lives of Siamese twins, the real problems start. In Lucy and Lena, Irvine Welsh has created two of his most memorable female protagonists, and one of the most bizarre, sadomasochistic folie à deux in contemporary fiction.*The Sex Lives of Siamese Twins*taps into two great obsessions of our time-how we look and where we live-and tells a story so subversive and dark it blacks out the Florida sun.
*****When Lucy Brennan, a Miami Beach personal-fitness trainer, disarms an apparently crazed gunman chasing two frightened homeless men along a deserted causeway at night, the police and the breaking-news cameras are not far behind. Within hours, Lucy becomes a hero. Her celebrity is short-lived, though: the "crazed gunman," turns out to be a victim of child sexual abuse and the two men are serial pedophiles.
*****The solitary eye-witness, the depressed and overweight Lena Sorenson, thrilled by Lucy's heroism and decisiveness, becomes obsessed with the trainer and enrolls as a client at her Bodysculpt gym. It quickly becomes clear that Lena is more interested in Lucy's body than her own. Then, when one of the pedophiles she allowed to escape carries out a heinous sex attack, Lucy's transition from hero to villain is complete. When Lucy imprisons Lena, and can't stop thinking about the sex lives of Siamese twins, the real problems start. In Lucy and Lena, Irvine Welsh has created two of his most memorable female protagonists, and one of the most bizarre, sadomasochistic folie à deux in contemporary fiction.*The Sex Lives of Siamese Twins*taps into two great obsessions of our time-how we look and where we live-and tells a story so subversive and dark it blacks out the Florida sun.
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Product Details
| BN ID: | 2940171994495 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Penguin Random House |
| Publication date: | 02/03/2015 |
| Edition description: | Unabridged |
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