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Liepman Literary Agency
Marc Koralnik
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English
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BROKEN SLEEP

Bruce Bauman

This rollicking saga of a novel spans the 1940's to 2020's in America, touching on rock music, art, politics, fame, and fundamentally probing the elusive nature of love.
When Moses Teumer is diagnosed with cancer and discovers he needs a bone marrow transplant in order to survive, his mother is forced to reveal a family secret that she has held for decades—that he was adopted. Moses then sets off on a quest to find a relative willing and able to save him. Along the way, he is reunited with his biological mother, Salome Savant, an avant-garde artist committed to a mental institution, as well as her son Twilight, a rock-star-turned-politician and Moses's half-brother. An epic saga that hurtles across more than three quarters of a century—from the 1950s to the 2030s, through the bleak shadows thrown by concentration camps and 9/11—Broken Sleep follows the intertwined destinies of four narrators, who present disparate stories in the manner of a modern-day Gospels. Bauman's philosophical, humorous, and compelling storytelling ponders many different riddles of exile—personal, political, spiritual—with an always acute eye and an unfailing intense empathy. BRUCE BAUMAN is the author of the novel And The Word Was (2005). His work has appeared in the LA Times, Salon, BOMB, Bookforum, and numerous anthologies and literary magazines. He is adjunct professor in the CalArts MFA Writing Program. Married to the painter Suzan Woodruff, Bruce Bauman lives in Los Angeles.
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Published by Other Press

Comments

Broken Sleep is an interlocking puzzle of personalities and it is an enthralling read to witness how Bauman orchestrates their intermingling, unions and denouements. Added to this ménage of characters are cameos of such icons as Greta Garbo and others who bear a strong resemblance to real life beat generation heroes. Bauman takes advantage of the time and place of his novel to create a running commentary on art and music. It provides a portrait of an era in a way that only great fiction can do as opposed to standard works of non-fiction. Read more...

A colossal, unreasonably marvelous book, this novel is about life and how to live it as much as it is about how not to. Bauman is a modern master and his control, his pace and his compassion are things to marvel at. Broken Sleepis rich, hilarious and shot through with the kind of winning velocity whose aural equivalent is a pop song that comes with the kind of massive chorus that will bring you to your knees and make you feel like the world will never end. Read more...

"Bruce Bauman's novel Broken Sleep is sprawling, complex, wildly imaginative and unflaggingly emotional. It has an astonishing range, not only in theme but structure, which becomes all the more impressive when Bauman admits, below, that he does not believe in using outlines." - Huffington Post

"In this mind-bending work of fiction that entwines generations and continents, each character represents contemporary life's most existential crises." - Shelf Awareness