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This Census-Taker by China Miville

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This Census-Taker by China Miville

For readers of George Saunders, Kelly Link, David Mitchell, and Karen Russell, This Census-Taker is a stunning, uncanny, and profoundly moving novella from multiple-award-winning and bestselling author China Miéville.

NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY NPR

In a remote house on a hilltop, a lonely boy witnesses a profoundly traumatic event. He tries--and fails--to flee. Left alone with his increasingly deranged parent, he dreams of safety, of joining the other children in the town below, of escape.

When at last a stranger knocks at his door, the boy senses that his days of isolation might be over.

But by what authority does this man keep the meticulous records he carries? What is the purpose behind his questions? Is he friend? Enemy? Or something else altogether?

Filled with beauty, terror, and strangeness, This Census-Taker is a poignant and riveting exploration of memory and identity.

Praise for This Census-Taker

"China Miéville is a magician . . . who can both blow your mind with ideas as big as the universe and break your heart with language so precise and polished, it's like he's writing with diamonds."--NPR

"The book haunts the reader; what actually happened seems always just out of reach, glimpsed in shadow as it rounds a corner ahead of our vision."--Los Angeles Review of Books

"[Mieville's] been compared to Karen Russell and George Saunders, and rightfully so."--The Huffington Post

"Marvellous."--The Guardian

"Lingers in the mind like an unsettling dream."--Financial Times

"A thought-provoking fairy tale for adults . . . [This Census-Taker] resembles the narrative style, quirkiness, and plotting found in the works of Karen Russell, Aimee Bender, or Steven Millhauser."--Booklist

"Brief and dreamlike . . . a deceptively simple story whose plot could be taken as a symbolic representation of an aspect of humanity as big as an entire society and as small as a single soul."--Kirkus Reviews
China Mieville is the author of several books, including Un Lun Dun, Perdido Street Station, The City & The City, Kraken, & Embassytown. His works have won the Hugo, the British Science Fiction Award (twice), the Arthur C. Clarke Award (three times) & the World Fantasy Award. He lives & works in London.
SKU Unavailable
ISBN 13 9781101967348
ISBN 10 110196734X
Title This Census-Taker
Author China Miville
Condition Unavailable
Binding Type Paperback
Publisher Random House USA Inc
Year published 2017-01-03
Number of pages 272
Cover note Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary.