The internationally acclaimed debut of a novelist described by the New York Times Book Review as a "lovely comic surrealist"--a story of sex, love, and art found in the unlikeliest of places
Jeremy Acidophilus is not really named after the yogurt culture--he just likes to tell people that he is. Actually, he thought of that line years ago but has never been brave enough to use it on someone--until he meets Lady Henrietta over a dish of green Jell-O in his new favorite coffee shop. A painter of naked men for Playgirl magazine who has taken her name from The Picture of Dorian Gray, Henrietta has the power to make Jeremy do all kinds of things he would not normally do, including disrobe for a stranger. He thinks that he must be falling in love. Think again, says Sara, the artist's outrageously precocious eleven-year-old daughter as she sets out to seduce the new model.
From the gray streets of Manhattan to the pastel kaleidoscope of Disney World, Jeremy's journey of self-discovery is both irresistibly absurd and uncannily real. Everyone--from his cat Minou to a dancing magician named Laura to the agents hired by his mother to taunt him--has advice for Jeremy. Before he can hear any of it, though, he first needs to find out how to listen to himself.
A witty and wild exploration of sexuality, creativity, and the paradoxes of self, Nude Men is the rare novel with the power to charm and shock in equal measure.
Jeremy Acidophilus is not really named after the yogurt culture--he just likes to tell people that he is. Actually, he thought of that line years ago but has never been brave enough to use it on someone--until he meets Lady Henrietta over a dish of green Jell-O in his new favorite coffee shop. A painter of naked men for Playgirl magazine who has taken her name from The Picture of Dorian Gray, Henrietta has the power to make Jeremy do all kinds of things he would not normally do, including disrobe for a stranger. He thinks that he must be falling in love. Think again, says Sara, the artist's outrageously precocious eleven-year-old daughter as she sets out to seduce the new model.
From the gray streets of Manhattan to the pastel kaleidoscope of Disney World, Jeremy's journey of self-discovery is both irresistibly absurd and uncannily real. Everyone--from his cat Minou to a dancing magician named Laura to the agents hired by his mother to taunt him--has advice for Jeremy. Before he can hear any of it, though, he first needs to find out how to listen to himself.
A witty and wild exploration of sexuality, creativity, and the paradoxes of self, Nude Men is the rare novel with the power to charm and shock in equal measure.
- "A quirky, unpredictable comedy of contemporary urban morals . . . Reminiscent of some of Philip Roth's zanier explorations of identity and sexuality."
--Chicago Tribune
- "An optical illusion novel: savor the shimmering wit and sharp writing from a distance; or get close and risk seeing something that may shock you."
--Details
- "Its particular brand of sly naivete . . . is all its own. . . . Exuberantly inventive . . . Droll, mesmerizing and unexpectedly memorable."
--Publishers Weekly
- "Filipacchi's novel of manners . . . is a sly look at contemporary sexual politics and mores."
--Vanity Fair
- "Deftly comic and ingenuous . . . intelligent, imaginative, and, with every page, increasingly surreal."
--Library Journal
- "Nude Men is everything you don't expect it to be--hilarious, full of plot surprises, and completely original."
--Louis Malle
- "Witty and unpredictable to the end, Nude Men is a quirky tale of twisted morals."
--Vogue
- "Filipacchi is fearsomely witty. . . . A truly clever first novel, one that makes you feel clever as you read it."
--The Village Voice
- "What if Humbert were more hapless and Lolita downright lewd, her mother only too eager to conspire in seduction? Add to this a talking cat, a magician whose success depends on her lack of talent, a parrot who quotes Kubler-Ross, and any number of nude men. Playful, perverse, and wonderfully funny, it's hard to say whether Amanda Filipacchi's first novel is rescue from or a fatal case of the human condition. Either way, here is an irresistible introduction to a sublimely precocious writer."
--Kathryn Harrison
