A PHILOSOPHY OF RUIN

Riveting fun to read. (New York Times Book Review)An unforgettable debut. Mancusi is a writer to watch. (Alexander Chee author of How to Write an Autobiographical Novel)A Time Magazine Best Book of SummerA Vol. 1 Brooklyn Book of the MonthA LitHub Most Anticipated Book of SummerAn Evening Standard Summer Reading PickAn InsideHook Best Book of the Month A young philosophy professor finds himself in the middle of a drug-running operation after his personal life derails in this taut white-knuckle debut for fans of Breaking BadOscar Boatwright a disenchanted philosophy professor receives terrible news. His mother on her way home from Hawaii with Oscar''s father has died mid-flight her body cooling for hours until the plane can land.Deeply grieving Oscar feels his life slipping out of his control. A seemingly innocuous one-night stand with a woman named Dawn becomes volatile when on the first day of classes he realizes she is his student and later learns that she is a fledgling campus drug lord. To make matters worse his family is in debt having lost their modest savings to a self-help guru who had indoctrinated Oscar''s mother by preying on her depression. Desperate to help his family Oscar breaks with his academic personality - he agrees to help Dawn with a drug run.A Philosophy of Ruin rumbles with brooding nihilism then it cracks like a whip hurtling Oscar and Dawn toward a terrifying threat on the road. Can Oscar halt the acceleration of chaos? Or was his fate never in his control? Taut ferocious and blazingly intelligent A Philosophy of Ruin is a heart-pounding thrill ride into the darkest corners of human geography and a philosophical reckoning with the forces that determine our destiny.