UK | USA | Canada | Ireland | Australia
India | New Zealand | South Africa
Hamish Hamilton is part of the Penguin Random House group of companies whose addresses can be found at global.penguinrandomhouse.com.
First published in the United States of America by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt 2017
First published in Great Britain by Hamish Hamilton 2017
Copyright © Paul Theroux, 2017
The moral right of the author has been asserted
Cover design: gray318
This is a work of fiction. Although the author has drawn on events and places in his life for inspiration, the names, characters and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination, and all dialogue and interaction between the characters are entirely fictional. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental
ISBN: 978-0-141-96038-8
Part One
1: Mother of the Year
2: “This is for the Best”
3: Do You Believe in Rock and Roll?
4: Loyalty Oaths
5: Mr. Bones
6: Mother Land
7: Home Life
8: Wedding Balls
9: Self-Denial
10: The Best Year of My Life
11: Secrets
12: Disclosure
13: Visits
14: Whispers
15: Outsider
16: Crazy Bastard
17: Good Sport
18: Second Childhood
19: The Side Effects of Melancholy
Part Two
20: Holidays
21: Traitors
22: Ten Minutes from Mother
23: The Acre
24: The Cottage
25: Struggles
26: Reminders
27: The Letter
28: Charlie
29: Birthday Cards
30: Upside-Down Cake
31: My Nature is to Sting
32: Station Identification
33: Cat Burglary
34: Rewards
Part Three
35: The Algebra of Love
36: Checks and Balances
37: Defiance
38: Hot Dinners
39: A Nest of Vipers
40: Mottle Sin
41: “What Are You Doing Here?”
42: Bad News
43: Best Man
44: Winners
45: Aliens
46: My Muse
Part Four
47: Pastoral
48: Angor Animi
49: The Survivor
50: The Kindly Ones
51: Mother’s Century
52: Memento Mori
53: The Unknown
54: Arcadia
55: Clambake
56: Angela
57: Bulletins
58: Strangers
Follow Penguin
Fiction
WALDO
FONG AND THE INDIANS
GIRLS AT PLAY
MURDER IN MOUNT HOLLY
JUNGLE LOVERS
SINNING WITH ANNIE
SAINT JACK
THE BLACK HOUSE
THE FAMILY ARSENAL
THE CONSUL’S FILE
A CHRISTMAS CARD
PICTURE PALACE
LONDON SNOW
WORLD’S END
THE MOSQUITO COAST
THE LONDON EMBASSY
HALF MOON STREET
O-ZONE
MY SECRET HISTORY
CHICAGO LOOP
MILLROY THE MAGICIAN
MY OTHER LIFE
KOWLOON TONG
HOTEL HONOLULU
THE STRANGER AT THE PALAZZO D’ORO
BLINDING LIGHT
THE ELEPHANTA SUITE
A DEAD HAND
THE LOWER RIVER
MR. BONES
MOTHER LAND
Criticism
V. S. NAIPAUL
Non-fiction
THE GREAT RAILWAY BAZAAR
THE OLD PATAGONIAN EXPRESS
THE KINGDOM BY THE SEA
SAILING THROUGH CHINA
SUNRISE WITH SEAMONSTERS
THE IMPERIAL WAY
RIDING THE IRON ROOSTER
TO THE ENDS OF THE EARTH
THE HAPPY ISLES OF OCEANIA
THE PILLARS OF HERCULES
SIR VIDIA’S SHADOW
FRESH AIR FIEND
DARK STAR SAFARI
GHOST TRAIN TO THE EASTERN STAR
THE TAO OF TRAVEL
THE LAST TRAIN TO ZONA VERDE
DEEP SOUTH
Mother, Mother, Mother, Mother, Mother, please. Mother, please, please, please. Don’t — don’t do this. Don’t do this.
Lay down your life with your child.
— Jim Jones, Jonestown “Death Speech,” November 28, 1978
Great hatred, little room,
Maimed us at the start.
I carry from my mother’s womb
A fanatic heart.
— William Butler Yeats
