the_fearsome_particles_cole
2008 Nominated

The Fearsome Particles

artwork-image

ABOUT
THE BOOK

Gerald Woodlore, a window screen executive, wakes one morning to find, to his utter dismay, that he has reached the limits of what he can control. The company he works for is rapidly losing market share and a junior assistant seems to be the only one with an idea how to fix it. His wife, Vicki, a luxury real-estate dresser, appears to be bending under the pressures of constructing an image of perfect happiness both at work and at home. But most worrying of all is Gerald and Vicki’s twenty-year-old son, Kyle, who quit school to volunteer with the military’s civilian support staff in Afghanistan. Now he has returned early and retreated to his room in the wake of a mysterious and traumatic event.

With his trademark wit and strong emotional insight, Trevor Cole has created a compelling, tender story that captures a family at a crucial turning point.

ABOUT
THE AUTHOR Trevor
Cole

Trevor Cole is an award-winning journalist and novelist. Way back when, he started in radio, writing ads for local businesses in Simcoe, Cornwall and Ottawa, Ont. He made the move to magazine journalism in the mid-eighties and ended up at The Globe and Mail, where he stayed for nearly fifteen years. As a journalist, he has won nine National Magazine awards and still writes for magazines such as Report on Business MagazineCanadian GeographicMacleans and Toronto Life.
 His first two books — Norman Bray in the Performance of His Life and The Fearsome Particles — were both short-listed for the Governor General’s Literary Award and long-listed for the IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. Norman Bray was also short-listed for the Commonwealth Writer’s Prize for Best First Book in the Canada-Caribbean region. His next two novels could not have been more different. The dark comedy Practical Jean, published in 2010, was nominated for the Rogers’ Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize and won the famous Leacock Medal for Humour. His fourth novel, Hope Makes Love, published by Cormorant Books in 2014, was a hard-to-categorize exploration of love, neuroscience and the trouble that men can cause women.
Trevor Cole is an award-winning journalist and novelist. Way back when, he started in radio, writing ads for local businesses in Simcoe, Cornwall and Ottawa, Ont. He made the move to magazine journalism in the mid-eighties and ended up at The Globe and Mail, where he stayed for nearly fifteen years. As a journalist, he has won nine National Magazine awards and still writes for magazines such as Report on Business MagazineCanadian GeographicMacleans and Toronto Life.
 His first two books — Norman Bray in the Performance of His Life and The Fearsome Particles — were both short-listed for the Governor General’s Literary Award and long-listed for the IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. Norman Bray was also short-listed for the Commonwealth Writer’s Prize for Best First Book in the Canada-Caribbean region. His next two novels could not have been more different. The dark comedy Practical Jean, published in 2010, was nominated for the Rogers’ Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize and won the famous Leacock Medal for Humour. His fourth novel, Hope Makes Love, published by Cormorant Books in 2014, was a hard-to-categorize exploration of love, neuroscience and the trouble that men can cause women.
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NOMINATING LIBRARY COMMENTS

A novel of modern life and angst that is funny and poignant at the same time.

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION

Country
Canada
Original Language
English
Author
Publisher
McClelland & Stewart

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