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	Fritz Agency Christian Dittus
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A PHILOSOPHY OF RUIN

Nicholas Mancusi

Nicholas Mancusi's THE RUINS is a taut philosophical thriller about a young professor whose life spirals out of control after the death of his mother. In this darkly comic debut novel about free will and entropy, Mancusi channels the nihilism of Breaking Bad's Walter White, the literary suspense of Jonathan Lethe's Motherless Brooklyn, and the gritty humor of Denis Johnson's Nobody Move.

Deeply grieving, Oscar Boatright is preoccupied by life's big questions. He falls into a relationship with Dawn, his student and a drug dealer, who needs some help with a big shipment that's about to come in. To make matters worse, Oscar learns that his family is in debt to a messianic conman who had indoctrinated Oscar's mother by preying on her depression and evangelizing against free will. Obsessed with the man's lectures and desperate to help his family, Oscar breaks with his academic personality and adopts an unhinged fatalism: he agrees to help Dawn. Soon, Oscar is fleeing across the desert, pursued both by murderous narco-terrorists and the philosophical concerns that have plagued him his entire life.

Nicholas Mancusi has written about books and culture for the New York Times Book Review, Washington Post, Daily Beast, Miami Herald, Boston Globe, Minneapolis Star Tribune, Newsday, Newsweek, NPR Books, American Arts Quarterly, BOMB magazine, and other publications. He lives in Brooklyn.

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Book Published 2019-06-01 by Hanover Square Press (HC)

Comments

Nicholas Mancusi's potent first novel trembles along the fault lines of our destinies and dread. His protagonist, Oscar Boatwright, is an uncommon quester with a vision, and not someone you are likely ever to forget. Honed in prose that reaches both within and without, Philosophy of Ruin boasts what many novels don't even know they need: a gusto unafraid of sounding what is best and worst in us. -- William Giraldi, author of Hold the Dark

A PHILOSOPHY OF RUIN is the smartest blend of philosophy seminar and action movie. I loved it. -- Caroline Kepnes

One of the most anticipated books of the summer Read more...

You don't really know your parents completely until after their death, when you meet them at last, without their being able to distract you from what they don't want you to seebut nothing prepares you for how you meet yourself at the same time. This is where A PHILOSOPHY OF RUIN begins. Funny, wise, mature beyond its years, this is a fable of late capitalism, a cautionary tale about aging parents, and an unforgettable debut. Mancusi is a writer to watch. -- Alexander Chee, author of How to Write an Autobiographical Novel and The Queen of the Night

"Mancusi's debut novel displays dark humour and intellectual depth." (32 Books You Need to Read This Summer)

A PHILOSOPHY OF RUIN is a wickedly sharp comic novel, darkly hilarious yet also big-hearted and full of surprising twists and turns. I couldn't put it down. Dan Chaon, author of Ill Will

For all its edgy, downbeat humor, the novel inspires a deep emotional investment in Oscar. The big existential questions that get asked are brilliantly framed by his antics. The payoff is, dare we say it, profound. Brooklyn writer Mancusi's revelatory novel is a drug tale with a differenceeven the chase scenes are philosophical. (starred review)

For all its edgy, downbeat humor, the novel inspires a deep emotional investment in Oscar. The big existential questions that get asked are brilliantly framed by his antics. The payoff is, dare we say it, profound. Brooklyn writer Mancusi's revelatory novel is a drug tale with a difference - even the chase scenes are philosophical --Kirkus, starred review

What novel has the audacity to pair serious meditations on human free will with an antic high-stakes caper about making fast money by going dangerously south of the law? Nicholas Mancusi's debut novel, that's what. At turns harrowing and hilarious, deeply affecting and bad-ass clever, A PHILOSOPHY OF RUIN fights against all expectations and delivers something truly weird and wonderful. A thinking person's novel strapped to a stolen firearm. -- Christopher Bollen

A PHILOSOPHY OF RUIN is grounded in deeply-felt and closely-related family dynamics. But the story is about the pressure below the bedrock, how the roiling energy of a family finds a fissure and erupts into the air. Nicholas Mancusi has written a big-hearted explosion of a father and son story, each man shot out into the world at the wildest of vectors and landing as smoldering rubble. (Will Chancellor)

"...an action movie whose disasters are riveting fun to read. (...) In 'Poetics', Aristotle claims that a good ending ought to be 'surprising, yet inevitable.' By that measure, the catharsis of 'Mostly Dead Things' delivers." Read more...