Ghostwritten: A Novel in Nine Parts

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Sceptre, 1999 - Cognition and culture - 436 pages
An apocalyptic cult member carries out a gas-attack on a rush-hour metro, but what connects him to a jazz-buff in Tokyo? A Mongolian gangster, a redundant English spy in Petersburg with a knack for forging masterpieces, a despondent "zookeeper", a nuclear scientist, a ghostwriter, a ghost, and a late night New York DJ whose hard-boiled scepticism has been his undoing all also have stories to tell. Add to this saxophones and causality, Buddha, cherry blossoms, island cities, a mind unhooked from memory, the Trans Siberian express, hidden narratives of the new world's order, circles and roulette in London, Baggins the Tarantula and a quantum computer born one century ahead of its time. All elements are interconnected and each character must play their part as they are caught up in the inescapable forces of cause and effect.

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About the author (1999)

David Mitchell's debut novel, GHOSTWRITTEN, was first published in 1999 and was awarded the Mail on Sunday/John Llewellyn Rhys Prize and was shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award. His second, NUMBER9DREAM, was shortlisted for the Booker Prize and the James Tait Black Memorial Prize. In 2003, David Mitchell was selected as one of Granta's Best of Young British Novelists and his third novel, CLOUD ATLAS, was shortlisted for 6 awards including the Man Booker Prize and won the British Book Awards Best Literary Fiction and the South Bank Show Literature Prize. He lives in Ireland with his wife and daughter.

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