Review
Mark Illis is a great stylist: eloquent, graceful, quiet. His work has wonderful subtlety and surprising strength. (Anne Enright )
Review
On Tender: Illis has an engaging style and his prose is vivid and inventively colloquial. (Times Literary Supplement )
On Tender: Tender can mean loving. But in this coolly observed, meticulously crafted family drama, one is reminded that it also means damaged, and acutely vulnerable to further hurt. (The Independent )
On Tender: Tender can mean loving. But in this coolly observed, meticulously crafted family drama, one is reminded that it also means damaged, and acutely vulnerable to further hurt. (The Independent )
Product Description
Gloria, meet Stephen. He’s your dead brother’s best friend. He’s also a liar, and he doesn’t want to hand over your brother’s belongings. He’s got a hair collection, and he’s got somebody’s teeth hidden in a drawer. An inconvenient spider’s going to play a crucial part in your relationship. Oh yes, and someone – God knows who – is sending him letters claiming it’s his fault Max is dead.
Stephen, meet Gloria. She’s not good with people. She wants you to hand over all Max’s most precious stuff. She likes to steal things, she gate-crashes funerals, she’s going to force you to revisit some of the most painful moments in your life. And she doesn’t know who’s writing the weird letters you’re getting, but she tends to agree – she thinks it might be your fault her brother killed himself. Oh yes, and it’s down to her that you’re going to wind up in hospital, and all over the papers. Well, the Scarborough papers anyway. On the plus side – you might get to sleep with her.
You’re going to be together for one strange, eventful and occasionally horrifying week so … good luck.
Stephen, meet Gloria. She’s not good with people. She wants you to hand over all Max’s most precious stuff. She likes to steal things, she gate-crashes funerals, she’s going to force you to revisit some of the most painful moments in your life. And she doesn’t know who’s writing the weird letters you’re getting, but she tends to agree – she thinks it might be your fault her brother killed himself. Oh yes, and it’s down to her that you’re going to wind up in hospital, and all over the papers. Well, the Scarborough papers anyway. On the plus side – you might get to sleep with her.
You’re going to be together for one strange, eventful and occasionally horrifying week so … good luck.
From the Author
I was diagnosed with cancer when I was 18. I had chemotherapy and a knee replacement, then six months of physio, then it came back and my leg was amputated, after which I refused further chemo. My writing has always circled round the subjects of death and loss and bereavement and this book is no exception. My own story has a happy ending however, and this book leads its surviving characters through a dark series of events to an optimistic conclusion.
One of the main characters of this novel is attempting to write a TV script. He has high hopes but the reception of the script is comically disappointing, and as a writer with a lot of experience in TV, I’m pretty familiar with this process.
One of the main characters of this novel is attempting to write a TV script. He has high hopes but the reception of the script is comically disappointing, and as a writer with a lot of experience in TV, I’m pretty familiar with this process.
