{"product_id":"books-the-gum-thief-by-douglas-coupland","title":"The Gum Thief","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eThe collector's two volume boxed set of \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003eDouglas\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cb\u003e Coupland's timeless office-store novel, \u003ci\u003eThe Gum Thief\u003c\/i\u003e, complete with a special edition of the novel-within-the novel, \u003ci\u003eGlove Pond\u003c\/i\u003e.\u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eIn Douglas Coupland's ingenious new novel--think \u003ci\u003eClerks\u003c\/i\u003e meets \u003ci\u003eWho's Afraid of Virginia Woolf\u003c\/i\u003e--we meet Roger, a divorced, middle-aged aisles associate at Staples, condemned to restocking reams of 20-lb. bond paper for the rest of his life; and Roger's co-worker Bethany, in her early twenties and at the end of her Goth phase, who is looking at fifty more years of sorting the red pens from the blue in aisle 6.\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eOne day, Bethany discovers Roger's notebook in the staff room. When she opens it up, she discovers that the old guy is writing mock diary entries pretending to be her: and, spookily, he is getting her right. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eThese two retail workers then strike up an extraordinary epistolary relationship. Watch their lives unfold alongside Roger's work in progress, the oddly titled \u003ci\u003eGlove Pond\u003c\/i\u003e, a tale of four academics, two malfunctioning marriages, and one rotten dinner party. \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003eRoger's magnum opus is available to the public for the first time in this boxed set. Together and separately, \u003ci\u003eThe Gum Thief\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eGlove Pond\u003c\/i\u003e confirm the visionary talent of Douglas Coupland, master chronicler of the absurdities of our times. Read them and remember that love, death and eternal friendship can all transpire where we least expect them ...and that even after tragedy seems to have wiped your human slate clean, stories can rebuild you.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"World of Books ","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":53669413093649,"sku":null,"price":0.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0784\/4072\/6801\/files\/9781596911062.jpg?v=1781508307","url":"https:\/\/www.worldofbooks.com\/products\/books-the-gum-thief-by-douglas-coupland","provider":"World of Books ","version":"1.0","type":"link"}