Rockets Versus Gravity

August 18, 2014
Scarsbrook (The Monkeyface Chronicles) takes readers on a fast-paced, emotional roller-coaster ride, spanning a single long July weekend in Ontario. More than a decade after creating the Indifference League as teens, the members have regrouped for their annual meeting (vacation) in keeping with their modus operandi—drinking and debauchery. But during this regrouping, on the cusp of their 30s, the secrets and lies that the antiheroes, including Mr. Nice Guy, the Statistician, and Hippie Avenger, have been keeping from each other boil to the surface. Tension builds as readers wait to see who will reveal what to whom, and, along the way, they get a close-up view of the way identities and friendships change as people grow up. Fans of Scarsbrook will recognize his unique humor, unshakable realism, and remarkable character construction. The combination of the prose style with recognizable tropes from comic influences, including unrevealing superhero trading cards and the omniscient narrative voice that mingles with each superhero’s narration, heightens the novel’s smart, thoughtful and outlandish qualities. Scarsbrook transforms a league of stereotypes into full, memorable, and entertaining heroes. Agent: Margaret Hart.