About the Author

Tim O'Brien was born in Minnesota. He served in Vietnam from 1969 to 1970, and after graduate studies at Harvard worked for the Washington Post. He established himself as one of the leading writers of his generation in 1973 with If I Die in a Combat Zone, the compelling account of his own tour of duty in Vietnam. Subsequent novels include Going After Cacciato, winner of the National Book Award, The Things They Carried, nominated for the Pulitzer, and In the Lake of the Woods, Time Magazine's 1994 Book of the Year. 'O'Brien is unquestionably a brilliant writer.' Glasgow Herald

Reviews

'An extraordinary novel, a sustained and sophisticated comedy.' Guardian 'Richly comedic... like a WASPish version of Roth's Portnoy's Complaint... dangerously funny.' Daily Express 'O'Brien is at his best in this macabre black comedy... a dark, clever fable... extremely funny.' Sunday Telegraph 'A wonderful novel, laugh-out-loud funny.' Washington Post 'Lust, laughs and literary mastery.' New York Post

Imagine that you are a publisher who is handed Tim O'Brien's unsolicited manuscript, Tomcat in Love, about a middle-aged Professor of Linguistics called Thomas Chippering. A `compulsive skirt-chaser', Chippering has been married for 20 years, is eight months divorced, and wants vengeance upon his wife for leaving him for her new husband. The plot seems fairly unremarkable and upon reading the first four chapters, the writing style matches this judgement. It is too flowery and ridiculous to entice you. You are going to put it down but decide to keep reading. The story grows on you. Where initially Chippering annoys you, you find yourself appreciating his verbosity as that of a lover of linguistics. You find yourself marvelling at his tireless obsession with women (he is described as a `fickle, randy old tomcat' with `a girl habit'). But mostly, you find that Chippering's glorified tales of war heroism in Vietnam, and his obsession with revenge and sex make you laugh. A lot. And loudly. Despite the backdrop of revenge, Chippering is refreshingly philosophical and witty (he describes a small girl he admires as `a pin-up girl for gnomes'). You finish Tomcat in Love with a smile on your face and decide to publish it. Michelle Atkins is contract and copyright coordinator/primary editor at Nelson ITP. C. 1998 Thorpe-Bowker and contributors

All of O'Brien's previous six novels, except perhaps The Nuclear Age, have a Vietnam War experience at their core. Men (and women) at war‘and warring with war's aftermath‘are themes that have sustained O'Brien's gifted narrative rushes and his beautiful prose, garnering him high praise, including a National Book Award (for Going After Cacciato). After the mixed reception of In the Lake of the Woods, O'Brien said he would stop writing fiction for a while. His return here will be welcomed by his many fans, but he is not in top form. The "Tomcat" of the title is one Thomas Chippering, a 6'6'' professor of linguistics whose wife has left him for "a tycoon in Tampa." Chippering narrates his woes, his scheme for revenge, the background to what he insists is his deep love for the departed Lorna Sue, all the while pursuing nubile coeds and the wife of a convicted tax felon. Although the book is being positioned as a comedy, Chippering is a most obnoxious companion, so terribly self-deluded, self-absorbed and self-satisfied, so pedantic and boorish, so convinced of his own charms that the unfolding drama of his pursuit of revenge becomes discomfiting. We want to root for his ex-wife, but through the Chippering "song of myself" we don't hear her, or know her. The Vietnam experience here, what there is of it, is ludicrously, and even disrespectfully, invoked by Chippering, who will remind those who attempt to resist his advances that he is a war hero. Although O'Brien is on interesting ground laying out Chippering's childhood crush on Lorna Sue in 1950s Minnesota, the book careens toward an unconvincing portrait of madness that is irritatingly flippant and shrill. BOMC and QPB alternates. Agent, Lynn Nesbit; editor, John Sterling. (Sept.)