Mimi
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- $16.99
Publisher Description
A whirlwind Manhattan romance like you've never read before from the Booker Prize nominated author of Ducks, Newburyport.
It's Christmas Eve in Manhattan. An eminent plastic surgeon slips on the ice, lands on his butt, and sprains his ankle. So far, so good. A woman such as he's never known yanks him to his feet and conjures the miracle of a taxi.
Harrison recuperates with Franz Schubert, Bette Davis, and a foundling cat. Then it's back to rhinoplasties, liposuction, and the peccadilloes of his obnoxious colleagues. It is only when he collides again with that strangely helpful woman that things take a wild and revolutionary turn.
Sparkling, polemical, irreverent, slippery, and sexy, Mimi is a love story, a call to arms, and Lucy Ellmann's most tender and dazzling book. It's also the feminist novel of the century. (So far.)
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
A curmudgeonly New Yorker discovers his inner feminist in Ellmann's incisive, witty sixth novel (after Doctors & Nurses). When noted plastic surgeon Harrison Hanafan slips on an icy patch of Madison Avenue sidewalk and sprains his ankle, he is aided by a "wacko broad" who puts him in a cab and then disappears. Harrison convalesces by listening to classical music, caring for a rescued stray cat, and panicking over the speech he's been asked to give for his high school alma mater when, suddenly, he encounters his mysterious savior and a quirky romance blooms. Mimi, his new love, proves a catalyst for discovering how much of his world revolves around the women in his life. He finds excitement and challenge with Mimi, a chief confidant in his older sister, Bee, and an adversary in his high-maintenance ex-girlfriend, Gertrude. Even his cat turns out to be female. When tragedy strikes, Harrison's ideas on women, culture, and society evolve even faster, and his conclusions crystallize into the speech of a lifetime. Ellmann's biting, absurd wit drives the oddball plot forward, and despite the tale's slow pace and Harrison's occasionally ponderous ramblings, at its heart is a memorable character with a unique voice and a provocative message.
