The Wife's Tale
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THE WIFE’S TALE by Lori Lansens 90,000 words / Final manuscript now available WITH SHARP HUMOUR AND DELICATE GRACE, THE WIFE’S TALE FOLLOWS MARY GOOCH — MORBIDLY OBESE AND LIVING IN DENIAL — AS SHE PURSUES HER HUSBAND ACROSS THE COUNTRY Mary is fat. Not just fat, but morbidly obese. She knows she’s fat (thank you very much) and lives her life in defensive, deflective blame, isolating herself in the small farming town of Leaford, Ontario, the locale of Lori Lansens’ first two novels. Everyone skirts the subject of her weight, the literal elephant in the room. Mary and her husband Gooch have gradually drifted away from each other. On their twenty-fifth wedding anniversary, Mary’s husband disappears. Bewildered, Mary abandons her sheltered life in pursuit of him across America, encountering a dazzling array of characters and discovering a boundless supply of human kindness in unexpected places. Runaway children, single mothers, taxi drivers, migrant workers and bitter relatives enter her life in chaotic Photo by Laura Starks fashion. Pounds melt away as she walks, runs, swims, drives and flies in momentous steps from claustrophobic Leaford to the freedom of California, her missing husband a spectre dogging each step. She discovers new worlds in hidden pockets of Los Angeles before she arrives at her final destination, the most unexpected surprise of all. The Wife’s Tale is a vivid exploration of a woman taking small, courageous steps toward her authentic self for the first time in her life. In pursuit of her husband, she finds herself instead. Mary Gooch is as indelible a creation as Sharla Cody and Addy Shadd of Rush Home Road and Rose and Ruby Darlen of The Girls. RIGHTS SOLD LORI Lansens was a successful screenwriter before she burst onto the literary US: Little, Brown & Co., February 2010 scene in 2002 with her first novel Rush Home Road. Published in eleven countries, UK: Virago, February 2010 Rush Home Road received rave reviews around the world. Her follow-up novel, Canada: Knopf, September 2009 The Girls, was an international success as well. Rights were sold in 13 territories Italy: Mondadori and it was featured as a book club pick by Richard & Judy in the UK, selling 300,000 copies. Born and raised in Chatham, Ontario, Lori Lansens now makes her home OPTION PUBLISHERS in Los Angeles with her husband and two children. IN OTHER TERRITORIES Holland: De Bezige Bij PRAISE FOR THE WORK OF LORI LANSENS Israel: Modan “I promise: you will never forget this extraordinary story...Lori Lansens’ Turkey: Sistem blend of tragedy and comedy will touch you deeply.” ISABEL ALLENDE Germany: Ullstein Poland: MAG “The Girls, by Lori Lansens, is a ballad, a melancholy song of two very Brazil: Editora Globo strange, enchanted girls who live out their peculiar, ordinary lives is a rural corner of Canada...The Girls glides by like a watercolor dream, Taiwan: Commonwealth finding its poetry in dailiness and the universalities of human desire and Sweden: Bra Bocker connection...Lansens, who has a gentle, open way of writing, makes of Serbia: Beobooks these two girls a kind of perfect marriage, harmonious and everlasting.” Czech Republic: BB Art THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW Portugal: Casa Das Letras Lithuania: Alma Littera “Extraordinarily moving: joyous, heartbreaking, and shot through with France: Editions de l’Archipel moments of dark humor...The voices of Rose and Ruby cry out to be heard for their glorious celebration of humanity.” VOGUE THE WIFE’S TALE an excerpt “HAVE YOU GOT SOMETHING to wear for the thing tomorrow night?” Gooch’s voice was erotica. He could arouse Mary with the merest stroke of tenor on her hot inner ear. She wondered why she’d never told him so, and felt sorry it no longer mattered. Frowning, Mary’d tugged at the waistband of her uniform, the largest of the ladies’ plus sizes so she’d have to go into the large men’s sizes now, and Ray Russell Junior, the owner/manager of the drugstore would have to place the order for her. The thought burned her cheeks, since she’d recently overheard Ray and Candace making unfunny comments about her ass — Candace suggesting they take up a collection for gastric by-pass, and Ray remarking that it was so big it should have its own blog. Now she had to clear her throat or cough before entering the staff room. Mary had assured, “I’ll find something.” “What about the green thing you bought?” Gooch had asked carefully. “The zipper was broken,” she lied. “Remember what happened the last time you had to improvise? Buy something if you don’t have anything, Mare. This is important. Find something nice.” Shrunk an inch over the years, standing at the door in his custom-made work shirts and brown corduroy coat and dusty blue jeans from the Big Man’s store, ball cap plunked down on his wavy grey head, complexion worn like a catcher’s mitt, Gooch looked handsome, but weary. Mary wondered if he seemed more or less tired than any forty-four-year-old man in any small town. She cocked her head, asking, “Are you sorry we’re doing this dinner tomorrow, Hon?” He’d paused, with that look on his face, and said, “Twenty-five years, Mrs. Gooch. That’s a hell of a thing. Right?” “It is,” she agreed. “When you gonna be home?” “Ten or so. But don’t wait up.” Gooch said the last after the back door banged shut. It was a hell of a thing to have been married for twenty-five years, but no one ever asked Mary her secret to a long marriage. She might have said, “Don’t call your husband at work.” Of course, throughout the years, Mary would have called Gooch’s pager or cell phone if there’d been an emergency but her life was fairly predictable and her tragedies rarely sudden. She’d nearly called Gooch at work when she’d gotten the news about her father’s passing, but had decided that like everything except her raging hunger, it could wait. She’d thought of calling Gooch at work just recently, the night she tipped the scale over three hundred pounds, but had instead collected the pain medications from the bathroom cabinet, remembering her vow to kill herself. Even as she was shaking tablets from vials at the kitchen table, Mary realized her false intentions and determined that the dosage was not potent enough for her extreme body weight anyway. The door had suddenly opened behind her and Gooch tramped inside, filling the house with his truck-oil scent and strong man vigor, calling, “Hey. You’re still up.” Shaking off his coat, pulling off his boots, he was preoccupied and hadn’t noticed the pills and vials on the table, which Mary swept into a plastic bag and quickly tossed in the trash. THE BUKOWSKI AGENCY 14 Prince Arthur Avenue, Suite 202, Toronto, Ontario M5R 1A9 Tel: (416) 928-6728 Fax: (416) 963-9978 e-mail: [email protected] www.thebukowskiagency.com DAHANU ROAD by Anosh Irani 80,000 words / Final manuscript coming soon AN IRREVERENT, EPIC LOVE STORY ABOUT THREE GENERATIONS OF THE IRANI CLAN, ZOROASTRIANS WHO FLED FROM PERSECUTION IN IRAN TO BOMBAY Zairos is a dissolute young landowner’s son living in the town of Dahanu, just outside Bombay, when his life of careless luxury is brought up short by a mysterious death: the sudden suicide of Ganpat, a tribal worker on his family’s estate. Soon he has fallen in lust with Ganpat’s daughter Kusum, and finds himself defying taboos with their relationship. At the same time his grandfather, Rustom, reveals to him the story of their family and of the land that Zairos stands to inherit. Dahanu Road exposes the history of the relationship between the landowning Irani clan and the Warlis, local tribal people like Ganpat and Kusum who work the land for them. As Zairos’ connection with Kusum deepens, he is drawn further into the mystery of Rustom’s relationship with Ganpat and the other Warlis. Violence and hatred echo through history, and Zairos learns the terrible truth his grandfather has spent a lifetime hiding. With an inimitable mix of earthy humour and searing tragedy, bestselling author Anosh Irani has given us his most ambitious novel yet. Photo by Tushna Shroff RIGHTS SOLD ANOSH Irani was born and brought up in Bombay, India, and moved to Vancouver Canada: Doubleday, spring 2010 in 1998. He is the author of the acclaimed novels The Cripple and His Talismans and Italy: Piemme, 2010 The Song of Kahunsha, which was a CBC Radio 2007 “Canada Reads” selection and a bestseller in Canada and Italy. Irani promoted the book at the Turin Book Fair and at OPTION PUBLISHERS Festival America in Paris. His play Bombay Black was a 2006 Dora Award winner for IN OTHER TERRITORIES Outstanding New Play. He was nominated for the 2007 Governor General’s Award for Spain: Alfaguara Drama for his anthology The Bombay Plays: The Matka King and Bombay Black. France: Editions Philippe Rey Israel: Kinneret PRAISE FOR THE WORK OF ANOSH IRANI Greece: Agyra Portugal: Quetzal “Irani is a gifted storyteller, and [The Song of Kahunsha], Dickensian in its Portugal (book club edition): plot and its vivid prose, is as beautiful as it is heartbreaking.” BOOKLIST Circulo de Leitores “Ultimately, The Song of Kahunsha is a story of hope and resilience in the Brazil: Editora Planeta face of terrible circumstances. Chamdi loses his innocence, but his dreams of a better place — of a Kahunsha — for him and his friends save his soul from the destruction and darkness that surround him...From the perspective of one child, Irani shows the long-lasting harm to individuals and society when different groups fight in the name of God.The Song of Kahunsha contains a damnation of religious violence in a multicultural society and a hope that the next generation, like Chamdi, will find a way to separate from it.” THE CHICAGO TRIBUNE “Anosh Irani...reveal[s] the tender heart of human need in his devastating yet surprisingly gentle novel.” MinneaPolis Star Tribune DAHANU ROAD an excerpt AS ZAIROS RODE TOWARDS Anna Purna’s chai stall, he welcomed the sun.