Emo

In the third volume of his REM trilogy, after the urban inferno of Nights with Giordano Bruno (2000) and the purgatorial stasis of The Imaginary Museum of Atlantis (2006), Jack Ross explores the closest thing to a paradise his cast of crazies can conceive of, let alone aspire to.

Ross is a lapidarian scholar, fluent in half a dozen languages, but he is also a passionate fan of America's Next Top Model, and his writing has always refused to distinguish between 'high' and 'low' culture. The very look of EMO mocks the conventions of both literature and academic scholarship - texts are artfully layered on its pages, alongside photographs, cartoons, and cryptic diagrams. Ross's prose is full of dirty jokes, as well as learned asides and sad observations. EMO could keep you busy for years on a desert island – Scoop review of books.