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Title details for Blue Ruin by Hari Kunzru - Available

Blue Ruin

A Novel

by Hari Kunzru
Hari Kunzru
Audiobook
1 of 1 copy available
Borrow Listen to a sample Listen to a sample
1 of 1 copy available
A MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK • From one of the sharpest voices in fiction today, a profound and enthralling novel about beauty and power, capital, art and those who devote their lives to creating it
Once, Jay was an artist. After graduating from art school in London, he was tipped for greatness, a promising career taking shape before him. That was not to happen. Now, undocumented in the United States, having survived Covid, he lives out of his car and barely makes a living as an essential worker, delivering groceries in a wealthy area of upstate New York. One day, as Jay attempts to make a delivery at a house surrounded by acres of woods, he is confronted by his destructive past: Alice, a former lover from his art school days, and the friend she left him for. Recognizing Jay’s dire circumstances, Alice invites him to stay on their property—where an erratic gallery owner and his girlfriend are isolating as well—setting in motion a reckoning that has been decades in the making.
Gripping and brilliantly orchestrated, Blue Ruin moves back and forth through time, delivering an extraordinary portrait of an artist as he reunites with his past and confronts the world he once loved and left behind.

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Release date

    May 14, 2024

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Listen audiobook

      • ISBN: 9780593864142
      • File size: 254916 KB
      • Duration: 08:51:04

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • Publisher's Weekly

      Starred review from February 5, 2024
      Kunzru (Red Pill) takes on the excessive and rapacious tendencies of the art world in his dazzling latest. Jay, a 40-something undocumented performance artist from India, left behind the competitive milieu of his London art school after becoming disillusioned, and has supported himself with various manual labor jobs. Now, during the first summer of the Covid-19 pandemic, he lives in his car and delivers groceries in Upstate New York. The gig brings him to the home of his ex-girlfriend Alice and his former best friend Rob, whom Alice left him for 20 years earlier in London. Fatigued and beleaguered by brain fog two months after getting Covid, Jay cautiously reenters his old friends’ lives. Alice, stuck managing Rob’s studio, is reminded of the freer life she used to lead with Jay, while Rob, a successful painter, reveals himself to be a consummate art monster, cheating on Alice and spending too much of their money on lavish, boozy parties. When Rob’s gallerist, Marshal, learns of Jay’s long-running self-documentation project, Fugue, he’s desperate to work with the performance artist. If Jay doesn’t let his life’s work be documented, Marshal argues, “It will slip away into nothingness you’re just some guy who left the art world.” The gripping tension between Jay and the rest of the cast gives way in the graceful final scene to a feeling as melancholy as watching a beloved painting get auctioned off in a beige room at Sotheby’s. This is immensely satisfying. Agent: Andrew Wylie, Wylie Agency.

    • AudioFile Magazine
      Hari Kunzru narrates his novel, set during the COVID-19 pandemic. Jay, once a rising star in the British art world, is now living in his car in the U.S. Kunzru lends his own English accent and gravelly timbre to working-class Jay. One day, on his pizza delivery route, Jay's ex, Alice, opens the door, feels sorry for him, and offers him shelter. She's living with the man she left him for on a large property. As Jay reconnects with the world he left behind and with his identity as an artist, a violent conspiracy theorist is also living with his girlfriend on the property. The convergence of these five characters creates a volatile mix. Kunzru's contemplative narration captures the deeply personal side of art in relation to the artist. C.R. © AudioFile 2024, Portland, Maine
    • Library Journal

      September 13, 2024

      Kunzru's (Red Pill) latest introduces 40-something Jay, who, while recovering from COVID, collapses at a woodland retreat currently inhabited by his ex-lover, Alice; Alice's husband, Rob, a painter who was once Jay's closest friend and rival; and Marshall, a driven gallerist. The characters had once been young artists in London, friends and lovers on the verge of graduating from art school and entering the glittering world of exhibitions, collectors, and museums. Later, Alice runs off to the U.S. with Rob, and Jay ends up there as well, living out of his car and delivering food and groceries to make ends meet. Now, as they settle into their tenuous COVID pod, the characters examine their lives and ambitions, considering the allure and shallowness of the art world, which Jay turned away from years ago, and Rob embraces with dissolute fervor. Kunzru offers a meticulous narration of his novel, with crisp received pronunciation that is carefully paced to reveal the inner workings of the characters' minds, seamlessly capturing their interiority and the tension that connects them all. VERDICT A moving examination of art, friendship, and desire, perfect for those who enjoyed Chelsea Martin's Tell Me I'm an Artist.--Laura Trombley

      Copyright 2024 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

Formats

  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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