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A NEW STATESMAN BOOK OF THE YEAR
A GUARDIAN READERS’ BOOK OF THE YEAR
At the end of his sorry life, Teddy Everett, reluctant heir to the Everett fortune realises that he may have been at his best when he was 14, the night Kebreth made him a communist by rubbing coffee bean oil on his face. Then he was with Lucy, who gave him Chinese burns and taught him how to smoke. As he remembers his family, his wives (and their lovers) he tries to understand what happened to that boy. Fuelled by caffeine and full of vituperation, this is a riotously original debut of honour, cowardice and bravery.
A GUARDIAN READERS’ BOOK OF THE YEAR
At the end of his sorry life, Teddy Everett, reluctant heir to the Everett fortune realises that he may have been at his best when he was 14, the night Kebreth made him a communist by rubbing coffee bean oil on his face. Then he was with Lucy, who gave him Chinese burns and taught him how to smoke. As he remembers his family, his wives (and their lovers) he tries to understand what happened to that boy. Fuelled by caffeine and full of vituperation, this is a riotously original debut of honour, cowardice and bravery.
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Reviews
'Reminiscent of Philip Roth's Everyman. But it's much, much funnier'
Part final-hour confession and part memoir... funny [and] imaginative
The Coffee Story is a wild and raucous novel fuelled by caffeine, an untrammelled lust for life and an inexhaustible desire to push at the boundaries of novelistic limitation. It's an extraordinarily accomplished debut, bursting with confidence and talent.
'Intense as a ristretto, sweet as a mocha, dark as a double espresso and satisfying as a cappuccino - The Coffee Story is one of the best first novels I have read in a long time, by one of the most exciting and original new writers. A real treat.'
'Like Coetzee's David Lurie, Teddy isn't the most appealing of heroes but his tale - and the remarkable voice in which it is told - compels us to listen. And, as with Disgrace, by the end of the novel we have assembled a portrait of a man more sympathetic, more engrossing, more heart-rending than we ever could have imagined at the outset. This is an exceptional debut.'
This isn't just a novel with exotic and evocative description, it's a novel woth grit, bite and sharp, sinister twists. Skilfully written with a wry disjointed narrative that convinces you that this is the disaffected deathbed confession of a man who has seen too much, The Coffee Story is a dark and sophisticated debut novel.
It is witty, deliciously nasty, highly intelligent, and has a broad scope, from 19th-century Europe to America in the 1970s. One of the most authoritative novels I've read.
It's been a while since I read a first novel that felt as universally accomplished as Peter Salmon's The Coffee Story. World, voice, humour, everything is in place.