Gym

Gym by Verena Kessler is a sweat-slicked, painfully funny novel about obsession, ambition and a woman’s doomed attempt to run from herself. Translated from the German by Lucy Lee Jones.

A woman walks into a gym and lies to get a job.

The gym is a palace of possibility. Here she can transform and start a new life, away from emails and presentations and stressful promotions.

And she can finally get her probation officer off her back.

When people start asking questions, she finds herself pushed to her limits again. A little lie can tumble into a big one, and we can never really escape who we are.

But you can get through anything when there’s no line you wouldn’t cross.

It’s just a question of willpower.