The Humanity Project: A Novel by Jean Thompson (English) Paperback Book

Description: The Humanity Project by Jean Thompson From the New York Times bestselling author of The Year We Left Home, a dazzling new novel hailed as an "instantly addictive...tale of yearning, paradox, and hope." (Booklist)From theNew York Timesbestselling author ofThe Year We Left Homeand A Cloud in the Shape of a Girl, this dazzling novel is hailed as an "instantly addictive...tale of yearning, paradox, and hope." (Booklist)After surviving a horrific shooting at her high school, fifteen-year-old Linnea is packed off to live with her estranged father, Art, in California. Art, not much more than a child himself, doesnt quite understand how or why he has suddenly become responsible for raising a sullen-and probably deeply damaged-adolescent girl. And although Linnea has little interest in her father, she becomes fascinated by the eccentric cast of characters surrounding him- Conner, a local handyman whose own home life is a war zone, and Christie, her neighbor, who has just been given the reins to a bizarrely named charity fund, the Humanity Project. As the Fund gains traction and Linnea begins to heal, the Humanity Project begs the question- Can you indeed pay someone to be good? At what price?Thompson proves herself at the height of her powers inThe Humanity Project,crafting emotionally suspenseful and thoroughly entertaining characters, in which we inevitably see ourselves. Set against the backdrop of current events and cultural calamity, it is at once a multifaceted ensemble drama and a deftly observant story of our twenty-first-century society. FORMAT Paperback LANGUAGE English CONDITION Brand New Author Biography Jean Thompson is the New York Times bestsellingauthor of numerous novels and story collections, among them A Cloud in the Shape of a Girl, The Year We Left Home, City Boy (a National Book Award finalist), and Wide Blue Yonder. She lives in Urbana, Illinois. Review Praise for Jean Thompson and The Humanity Project"[A] bracing narrative stance and a tart political viewpoint....[Thompson] is eerily good at inhabiting a wide range of perspectives and has a fine ear for the way young people speak to one another.... a novel that doesnt pretend to have any answers, comfortable or otherwise, but that vividly, insistently poses questions we should be asking."—Suzanne Berne, The New York Times"Thompson achieves exceptional clarity and force in this instantly addictive, tectonically shifting novel. As always, her affection and compassion for her characters draw you in close, as does her imaginative crafting of precarious situations and moments of sheer astonishment....Thompson infuses her characters bizarre, terrifying, and instructive misadventures with hilarity and profundity as she considers the wild versus the civilized, the "survival of the richest," how and why we help and fail each other, and what it might mean to "build an authentic spiritual self." Thompson is at her tender and scathing best in this tale of yearning, paradox, and hope."—Booklist, starred review"[A] penetrating vision of a lower-middle-class family sinking fast....Thompson has a knack for rendering characters who are emotionally fluid but of a piece [and] caps the story with a smart twist ending that undoes many of the certainties the reader arrived at in the preceding pages. A rare case of a novel getting it both ways: A formal, tightly constructed narrative that accommodates the mess of everyday lives."—Kirkus, starred review"[Humanity is] something that Thompson infuses into every sentence, striking true, clear notes...and telling [characters] stories in a way that doesnt offer resolutions so much as a messy, imperfect kind of grace. And whats more human than that?"—Leah Greenblatt, Entertainment Weekly"In prose that is gorgeously written but never showy...The Humanity Project rewards readers with the kind of immersive, thought-provoking experience that only expert storytelling can provide."—Justin Glanville, Cleveland Plain Dealer"[I]ts Thompsons own humanity project thats really interesting, heartfelt and farther-reaching....a tribute to Jean Thompsons art, which, beginning so slowly and seemingly simply, expands and deepens to contain multitudes without ever losing sight of each singular soul."—Ellen Akins, Minneapolis Star Tribune "With godlike power, Jean Thompson, author of The Humanity Project, throws her dented (and entirely recognizable) characters into the crucible of the American recession to reveal what it means to be human: flawed, and yet somehow worthy of redemption that comes in glimmers instead of bursts."—Christi Clancy, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel "Virtue is thin on the ground in Ms. Thompsons book, which follows the disparate lives of a handful of Northern Californians loosely tied together by coincidence and united more firmly by their ethical lapses....Ms. Thompson neither wallows [in] hardships nor sentimentalizes the grubby, compromised realities...Her lucid, no-frills prose gives her depictions of the other half the stamp of authenticity."—Sam Sacks, Wall Street Journal"The Humanity Project, the prolific Jean Thompsons sixth novel, weaves a rich, moving story of parents and children, money and poverty, virtue and evil....Thompson manages this complicated choreography masterfully."—Kate Tuttle, The Boston Globe"[E]vocative [and] often colored by a smart, dark humor...Conflicted, complex and compassionate when you least expect it: Thats us in a nutshell—and in Thompsons ultimately profound novel."—Connie Ogle, The Miami Herald"Thompson has crafted an incisive yet tender novel—a disturbing portrait of a thoroughly modern, fractured family stumbling toward grace in difficult times."—Meredith Maran, People"[A] forthright piece of social criticism...Thompson is also an accomplished story writer...attuned to the callousness of 21st-century society, its comedic elements, its misguided efforts to right itself, its often tragic results....Theres real beauty in the way Thompson has [characters] serve one another, even if that loving service is often not enough. It is, however, deeply human."—Helen Schulman, The New York Times Book Review Review Quote Praise for THE HUMANITY PROJECT: "[A] bracing narrative stance and a tart political viewpoint....[Thompson] is eerily good at inhabiting a wide range of perspectives and has a fine ear for the way young people speak to one another.... a novel that doesnt pretend to have any answers, comfortable or otherwise, but that vividly, insistently poses questions we should be asking." -Suzanne Berne, The New York Times "Thompson achieves exceptional clarity and force in this instantly addictive, tectonically shifting novel. As always, her affection and compassion for her characters draw you in close, as does her imaginative crafting of precarious situations and moments of sheer astonishment....Thompson infuses her characters bizarre, terrifying, and instructive misadventures with hilarity and profundity as she considers the wild versus the civilized, the "survival of the richest," how and why we help and fail each other, and what it might mean to "build an authentic spiritual self." Thompson is at her tender and scathing best in this tale of yearning, paradox, and hope." - Booklist , starred review "[A] penetrating vision of a lower-middle-class family Discussion Question for Reading Group Guide INTRODUCTION From the New York Times bestselling author of The Year We Left Home , a dazzling new novel hailed as an "instantly addictive...tale of yearning, paradox, and hope." ( Booklist ) After surviving a horrific shooting at her high school, fifteen-year-old Linnea is packed off to live with her estranged father, Art, in California. Art, not much more than a child himself, doesnt quite understand how or why he has suddenly become responsible for raising a sullen--and probably deeply damaged--adolescent girl. And although Linnea has little interest in her father, she becomes fascinated by the eccentric cast of characters surrounding him: Conner, a local handyman whose own home life is a war zone, and Christie, her neighbor, who has just been given the reins to a bizarrely named charity fund, the Humanity Project. As the Fund gains traction and Linnea begins to heal, the Humanity Project begs the question: Can you indeed pay someone to be good? At what price? Thompson proves herself at the height of her powers in The Humanity Project, crafting emotionally suspenseful and thoroughly entertaining characters, in which we inevitably see ourselves. Set against the backdrop of current events and cultural calamity, it is at once a multifaceted ensemble drama and a deftly observant story of our twenty-first-century society. ABOUT JEAN THOMPSON Jean Thompson is the author of five previous novels, among them The Year We Left Home, City Boy (a National Book Award finalist), and Wide Blue Yonder ; and five story collections. She lives in Urbana, Illinois. A CONVERSATION WITH JEAN THOMPSON 1. Why did you choose to set the novel in the Bay Area, just outside of San Francisco? Was there anything particular about that landscape that you thought would lend itself to the story you wanted to tell? I lived for a few years in Marin County. When youre new to a place you have a sharper eye for its features and idiosyncrasies. Marin is a beautiful natural landscape that has been settled and popularized by such an eclectic group of people: the wealthy and super-wealthy, the young and nouveau hip, and those just trying to maintain an economic toehold. It seemed like a perfect laboratory for the study of humanity, in fiction, at least. And I was struck by how many people were, like myself, from some other place entirely and attempting to start over again. Of course thats one important idea in the book. 2. One of the main characters, Linnea, is a survivor of a school shooting. As a writer, what effect do current events have on your work? What made you want to explore this issue in particular? You have to have a certain amount of tact in taking on current events, since a readers perception of them changes as other breaking news events accumulate. I wanted there to be a violent and traumatic happening that set this portion of the plot in motion, and settled on the shooting. I did try to be both specific in the single dramatic scene that youre shown, as well as somewhat generic in the larger circumstances. That is, it does not really matter why the shooter does what he does, only that it is fully and believably experienced by the characters. 3. What do you most hope readers will take away from your writing, and from this book in particular? I hope most of all that they enjoy the ride. I hope theres enough energy and entertainment in the story Im telling to keep a readers interest, and enough skill in the writing that people can take delight in language. As for "The Humanity Project", if it allows readers to meditate on the variety of human experience, and how we strive and most often fall short, and to see themselves in some aspect of one or more characters, then I am content. 4. What are you working on now? Ive been having a lot of fun writing stories which are based, in the loosest way possible, on classic fairy tales. We are always re-inventing them because they speak to us in such primeval and satisfying ways: evil-doers are punished, luck can change, good deeds (and bad ones) are rewarded in kind. Look for these stories in my newest book, "The Witch and Other Tales Re-Told." DISCUSSION QUESTIONS The novel opens with a brief chapter set in italics, and other similar passages are interspersed throughout the novel. Although the italicized section at the end of the book is clearly Linneas, who did you think was speaking in these earlier sections? What kind of voice does it seem to be? What brings Conner and Linnea together? Linnea refers to it as either a "desperate friendship or peculiar courtship." What do they give to each other? Does Linneas arrival change Art? How so? What compels him to reach out to Beata and invite her to lunch? Beata asks Art what hed like to be doing in ten years, and tells him that she wants "to be entirely new...new work, new house. Everything new and amazing." What do you make of this? What does it tell the reader about Beata? What does Arts reaction to this comment tell you about him? We get to know the characters both through the sections they narrate, and by the opinions and responses of other characters. Were there some characters you believed more than others? Was it interesting to pick out the discrepancies between different characters points of view? A reviewer of the book writes that it "vividly, insistently poses questions we should be asking." What, in your view, are the questions it asks? (Suzanne Berne, The New York Times Book Review ) Several characters wonder aloud what "The Humanity Project" means, or even what "humanity" means. Does the novel have an answer to this question? What is the purpose of the project? Is it actually definable? Does it succeed in any way? Towards the end of the novel, Christie wonders: "What if she were to allow herself to feel everything she really felt...why fight against her every instinct and impulse, bend herself into some impossible and hobbled shape, hold herself back with every step?" Why do you think it has "taken her so long to even ask" these questions? What does the book have to say about virtue? What is it, and what is it not? Does the novel make a judgment at all? Consider the parent-child relationships depicted in the novel: Linnea and Art, Conner and Sean, Leslie and Mrs. Foster, "Laurie" and the shooter. What kind of picture of parenthood does the book paint? Linnea says that she can understand why her mother chose her husband over her child. Do you believe her? Can you understand Linneas impulse to change her name and find a new identity? Why does she lie to Connor about what happened to Megan? Discuss Christie ("Nursie") and Seans reunion. Christie thinks, "how strange to be so remembered and so touched, in so much forlorn darkness." This line closes the main action of the novel. Would you consider it a hopeful end? Would you agree with Christie that "to be alive is to be, in spite of everything, hopeful?" Excerpt from Book ONE "Dad?" Gray morning. Hed fallen asleep in front of the computer again. The screen was gray too. "Yeah," Sean said. His voice was more awake than he was. He swung around in his chair. His son was standing in the doorway, tall, shaggy-haired, peering in at him. "Yeah," Sean said again. "OK, buddy." "Youre supposed to call that guy." "OK." Sleep was racing away and for another second he let himself follow it, his mind unraveling back into a dream that still held him under some impossible weight. Then he pushed the dream away, shut off the computer, planted his feet, and rose to meet the god-awful day. "Conner? Do I smell coffee?" "I got some started." "Thanks, bud." Coffee, then hed call that guy in Santa Rosa to see if he could get a few days work lined up, and if he couldnt, well, that was the next heap of crap to deal with. "Conner?" "Yeah?" "Quit worrying." Sean got the first of the coffee into him, then dialed. He could hear Conner moving around upstairs, getting ready for school. The phone in his hand came to life. "Hello, Mr. Nocera? Sean McDonald here, I was wondering if you could use me today." He listened for a minute, then said, "Sure. Well thanks for your time. Have yourself a good day." Nocera had already hung up, but Sean heard Conner coming down the stairs, so he pretended he was still talking while Conner opened the refrigerator and the cupboards, found a carton of chocolate milk, peanut butter crackers, a banana, and a handful of Oreos, which was either a weird breakfast or a weird lunch. "Dad?" Sean put his hand over the phone, shielding his imaginary conversation. "I already fed Bojangles." "Thanks. Knock em dead out there." "You too." He waited until Conner was out the front door before he put the phone down. Bojangles wanted in from the yard. He did his happy begging dance. "Scram, you con man," Sean said, and the dog went to his corner and lay down without complaint. Another day of nothing stretched ahead of him. He showered, fixed himself some eggs, then sat back down at the computer. The whole world was in the computer, if you knew how to figure things out, and you had to believe that somewhere out there were answers, solutions. Work and money, mostly. He checked Craigslist for help wanted. It was the same old stuff-- scams, mostly. Winter rain was going to start in soon and work would be even slower. He could fight the Guatemalans for landscaping jobs he didnt want anyway. He could enroll at the community college to take computer courses and be qualified for a whole new category of jobs where no one was hiring. Last month hed printed up five hundred flyers advertising himself as under windshield wipers in parking lots, came up with two jobs cleaning gutters and another hauling brush, and somebody who wanted a garage framed but didnt want to pay white mans wages. Hed get by. He always had. Things would turn around and you wouldnt feel like you were beating your head against the brick wall of the world. It wasnt just him. Times were bad for everybody, everybody had it coming. He guessed he was just a little farther ahead in the line than most people. Finished with the job listings, he let his fingers do the walking over to the personals. Women seeking Men. Like the help wanted, hed seen most of them before . Princess looking for her prince. Where did all the great guys go? Friends first. Looking for something real. None of them attached pictures, which was smart, he guessed, but made you waste a lot of time. Here was a new one: Pretty Lady, 38 . Maybe not pretty. Maybe not thirty-eight. Who knew? Sean clicked, and read: So how was your day? Mine too. I miss having somebody I can talk to. If you ever want to get out of the house some night for a while, you can pretend Im your best friend and tell me all about it. Me: normal in most respects. You: tired of reading these ads. Well at least she had a sense of humor. Sean thought for a minute, typed in the address. Hi Pretty Lady, I hear you loud and clear. Im a single dad. My son is seventeen. He already puts up with enough of my griping. Not that you have to put up with it either. But yeah, it would be nice if Here he paused for a long time. Nice if you could just lie down with a woman, have some naked good times, not worry about anything more. But you couldnt write that. I could get together with you some time and compare notes. Im 45, work as a carpenter, self employed, meaning Im broke most of the time, but I can always spring for a couple of drinks. Im 510" and as for looks, well, dogs dont bark at me. Im free most nights, hope that doesnt make me sound like a social reject, ha ha. He signed it Sean, then sent it off before he changed his mind. She wanted to talk. He was hornier than an eight-peckered toad, but he guessed talking had to come before anything else. He took his second cup of coffee outside and sat on the deck. The day was going to work its way into hazy heat. The hillside beyond his back fence was a tangle of manzanita and scotch broom and blond grass. So dry the least spark would send it up in flames and then he guessed it would be good- bye, house--that is, if Bank of America didnt get to it first, but there he was getting down again, letting the negative thoughts in, and so he put his feet up on the railing and smoked a little pot just to take the edge off things. It wasnt the life hed planned for himself but it was the life hed grown used to, it had its comforts, and it would be a sad and low-down thing if he got kicked out of it. His phone rang. Sean dug it out of his pocket, stared at the screen. Floyd. "Talk to me." "What are you doing, pencil dick?" "Your girlfriend." "Want to help me with some drywall?" "When, today?" "Whenever you can get over here." "Half an hour," Sean said. Sat for a moment longer to clear his head, then stood and stretched, and even if his body was sending out its usual SOSs (back, shoulders, elbow), he just had to get moving, work a few kinks out, tell himself he was thirty-five, not forty-five--well almost forty-six. Floyd would buy him lunch and throw a little folding money his way, a bad day turning into a not-bad one, and you had to have faith that things would work out eventually. He called to Bojangles and the dog leapt up, excited without knowing why, followed him out to the driveway, and ran in circles. Sean opened the trucks passenger door for him and the dog jumped in, happy all over again for no reason. Dumb dog. Sean checked the toolbox, grabbed a couple of Red Bulls from the fridge, and headed out. Now that he had the day back on track, he was able to look out on the world with something close to pleasure. His house, his street, his neighborhood might be a little shabby, the whole town mostly a place where old hippies came to plant backyard pot and gradually fall apart, but hed been here fifteen years now, almost all of Conners growing-up time, and it was home. He liked the who-gives-a-shit attitude of people who let their gut- ters drip rust, and strung Tibetan prayer flags across the front porch and kept too many cats. The younger ones he wasnt so sure of, thought they were probably cooking meth or some other nasty business and Conner had better not ever get mixed up in anything like that, hed beat his ass. But live and let live and anyway, there wasnt a sweeter place on the planet than Northern California, with its soft winters and golden grass and yeah he guessed he was still a little stoned. Floyd was trying to get his house in shape so he could put it on the market. He was one of those optimistic people who thought you could still get money out of a house. Floyds house sat well back from the street in its own cruddy yard of foxtails and thistles. A pile of PVC pipe lay to one side of the driveway, along with two sawhorses and a sheet of plywood set up as a workbench. To the left of the house was scaffolding, and a blue tarp spread over the flat roof, and ten-gallon buckets of sealant. Also odds and ends like an orange heavy-duty extension cord snaking out of the openfront door, a nail gun, a roll of fiberglass insulation, knuckle-shaped pieces of gutter. If you didnt know any better, you might think the house was being dismantled, not built up. Sean parked and let Bojangles out to run around. Floyd was inside, in the bedroom at the end of the hallway. Hed taken it down to the studs and he was standing there like he was confused about where his walls had gone. He was a big guy who was going to fat, with a baseball cap jammed down on his ears and a beard that grew up practically to his eyeballs, so there wasnt much actual face visible. "I just love what youve done to this room." "Funny." Sean popped one of his Red Bulls. "So, whats the plan?" "I cant believe you drink that shit. Its nothing but chemicals." "You get the sheets already, or are we going to Home Depot?" "I got everything. We need to do the cutouts." Floyd took his cap off, scratched and pulled at his ears, replaced the cap. "This house is gonna kick ass by the time I get it finished." "Its going to be sweet, Floyd." He would never get it finished and even if he did, it would still be a junky little undersized house. Th Details ISBN0142180904 Author Jean Thompson Short Title HUMANITY PROJECT Language English ISBN-10 0142180904 ISBN-13 9780142180907 Media Book Format Paperback DEWEY FIC Year 2014 Publication Date 2014-08-26 Imprint Plume Subtitle A Novel Place of Publication New York Country of Publication United States US Release Date 2014-08-26 UK Release Date 2014-08-26 Pages 352 Publisher Penguin Putnam Inc Audience General NZ Release Date 2014-08-25 AU Release Date 2014-08-25 We've got this At The Nile, if you're looking for it, we've got it. With fast shipping, low prices, friendly service and well over a million items - you're bound to find what you want, at a price you'll love! TheNile_Item_ID:137921883;

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