LoveReading Says
LoveReading Says
When financial wealth means physical size, everyone wants to get big. Watch out for the little people… A stunning read. A fascinating and complex novel of ideas that is also a fast and brutal gangland thriller. Like such master pieces as Nick Harkaway’s The Gone Away World or Jasper Fforde’s Shades of Grey, Jesse Andrews asks the reader to accept a world similar to ours, with one vital difference. In this case it is the fact that wealth equates with physical size; the more you have, the bigger you can grow. Those who live in poverty are barely the size of rats. Our slick narrator is a street kid trying to help his family. His story starts with the bold statements that his father was stepped on and his mother was crippled by a cat. With nothing but street smarts, muscles and badly thought-out plans, he and his sister try to make it into the big rich people’s society. It’s a heart-wrenching human story. Its also a vital social commentary. Some rich people are literally too big to see the poor. It is a frightening look at how blind western society can be. The language is both simple and complicated, a rhythm of fast-speech and truncated words that brings the slums and gangs vividly to life. Enjoyable and thought-provoking, surprising and disturbing, this book is really something special.
Sarah Broadhurst
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Munmun Synopsis
In an alternate reality a lot like our world, every person's physical size is directly proportional to their wealth. The poorest of the poor are the size of rats, and billionaires are the size of skyscrapers. Warner and his sister Prayer are destitute - and tiny. Their size is not just demeaning but dangerous: day and night they face mortal dangers that bigger, richer people don't ever have to think about, from being mauled by cats to their house getting stepped on. There are no cars or phones built small enough for them, or schools or hospitals, for that matter - there's no point, when no one that little has any purchasing power, and when salaried doctors and teachers would never fit in buildings so small. Warner and Prayer know their only hope is to scale up, but how can two littlepoors survive in a world built against them? Brilliant, warm and funny, this is a social novel for our times in the tradition of 1984 or the work of Douglas Adams.
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Press Reviews
Jesse Andrews Press Reviews
Somewhere in the unlikely intersection between 1984 and Douglas Adams sits Munmun, a hilarious and prescient novel that skewers the inequalities of today. In an alternative world, the poor are tiny and the rich skyscraper tall. Warner is the size of a rat, but for how long? - NetGalley
Shocking and funny, unsettling and charming - Roddy Doyle on THE HATERS
Funny, warm, enjoyably scatterbrained... An honest depiction of society's reaction to illness and death. - The Observer on ME AND EARL AND THE DYING GIRL
This was probably the funniest book I've ever read... Everyone should read this book. - The Guardian on ME AND EARL AND THE DYING GIRL
Munmun is satire at its finest: brilliant, insightful and at times hysterically funny. It's a powerful look at class, wealth and power in our modern world. - Nicola Yoon, bestselling author of EVERYTHING, EVERYTHING
Author
About Jesse Andrews
Jesse Andrews is the New York Times bestselling author of Me and Earl and the Dying Girl and the screenwriter of that book's Sundance Grand Jury Prize-winning movie adaptation. He's also the author of The Haters. He lives in Brooklyn.
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