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Broken People: A Novel
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Published:
Harlequin Audio 2020
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Available from OverDrive
Description
ONE OF THE MOST ANTICIPATED BOOKS OF THE YEAR
Vogue, O, The Oprah Magazine, Parade, Library Journal, Harper's Bazaar and more

"Profound and affecting."—Chloe Benjamin
"Broken People leads us through the winds of time and memory to offer a riveting portrait of transformation. I am better for having read it."—Jamie Lee Curtis
A groundbreaking, incandescent debut novel about coming to grips with the past and ourselves, for fans of Sally Rooney, Hanya Yanagihara and Garth Greenwell
"He fixes everything that's wrong with you in three days."
This is what hooks Sam when he first overhears it at a fancy dinner party in the Hollywood hills: the story of a globe-trotting shaman who claims to perform "open-soul surgery" on emotionally damaged people. For neurotic, depressed Sam, new to Los Angeles after his life in New York imploded, the possibility of total transformation is utterly tantalizing. He's desperate for something to believe in, and the shaman—who promises ancient rituals, plant medicine and encounters with the divine—seems convincing, enough for Sam to sign up for a weekend under his care.
But are the great spirits the shaman says he's summoning real at all? Or are the ghosts in Sam's memory more powerful than any magic?
At turns tender and acid, funny and wise, Broken People is a journey into the nature of truth and fiction—a story of discovering hope amid cynicism, intimacy within chaos and peace in our own skin.
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Format:
OverDrive MP3 Audiobook, OverDrive Listen
Edition:
Unabridged
Street Date:
06/09/2020
Language:
English
ISBN:
9781488208454
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Citations
APA Citation (style guide)

Sam Lansky. (2020). Broken People: A Novel. Unabridged Harlequin Audio.

Chicago / Turabian - Author Date Citation (style guide)

Sam Lansky. 2020. Broken People: A Novel. Harlequin Audio.

Chicago / Turabian - Humanities Citation (style guide)

Sam Lansky, Broken People: A Novel. Harlequin Audio, 2020.

MLA Citation (style guide)

Sam Lansky. Broken People: A Novel. Unabridged Harlequin Audio, 2020.

Note! Citation formats are based on standards as of July 2022. Citations contain only title, author, edition, publisher, and year published. Citations should be used as a guideline and should be double checked for accuracy.
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Date Added:
Jun 10, 2020 13:56:41
Date Updated:
May 09, 2022 18:44:50
Last Metadata Check:
Apr 21, 2024 14:28:26
Last Metadata Change:
Jun 05, 2023 14:38:56
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Apr 21, 2024 14:28:30
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Mar 03, 2024 16:26:54
Last Grouped Work Modification Time:
Apr 25, 2024 02:10:18

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ONE OF THE MOST ANTICIPATED BOOKS OF THE YEAR
Vogue, O, The Oprah Magazine, Parade, Library Journal, Harper's Bazaar and more

"Profound and affecting."—Chloe Benjamin
"Broken People leads us through the winds of time and memory to offer a riveting portrait of transformation. I am better for having read it."—Jamie Lee Curtis
A groundbreaking, incandescent debut novel about coming to grips with the past and ourselves, for fans of Sally Rooney, Hanya Yanagihara and Garth Greenwell
"He fixes everything that's wrong with you in three days."
This is what hooks Sam when he first overhears it at a fancy dinner party in the Hollywood hills: the story of a globe-trotting shaman who claims to perform "open-soul surgery" on emotionally damaged people. For neurotic, depressed Sam, new to Los Angeles after his life in New York imploded, the possibility of total transformation is utterly tantalizing. He's desperate for something to believe in, and the shaman—who promises ancient rituals, plant medicine and encounters with the divine—seems convincing, enough for Sam to sign up for a weekend under his care.
But are the great spirits the shaman says he's summoning real at all? Or are the ghosts in Sam's memory more powerful than any magic?
At turns tender and acid, funny and wise, Broken People is a journey into the nature of truth and fiction—a story of discovering hope amid cynicism, intimacy within chaos and peace in our own skin.
reviews
      • premium: True
      • source: Publisher's Weekly
      • content:

        April 13, 2020
        Lansky follows his addiction memoir The Gilded Razor with a riveting novel about an L.A. writer named Sam who recently published a memoir about his drug and alcohol addiction. Sam, 28, and a friend plan to visit a shaman in Portland, Ore., on the strength of a testimonial that the shaman “fixes everything wrong with you in three days.” With humor, verve, and cut-to-the-bone revelations, Lansky takes readers on an enthralling adventure as Sam reckons with his anxiety and discomfort with his body. Over three days in Portland, thanks to the shaman’s perspicacious insight, drumbeating, chanting, and careful administration of ayahuasca, Sam enters a mode of deep self-reflection. Lansky’s mesmerizing descriptions are unflinchingly raw as Sam examines his life choices, his self-obsession, and his mistreatment of men in his life, particularly Charles, his first real love. Lansky also offers a canny snapshot of modern gay life, with the specter of HIV hovering over intimate relationships. While Sam’s whining about his body occasionally grates, the author keeps the reader on his side with an endless supply of wit. Lansky’s tale of self-acceptance offers surprising depth.

      • premium: True
      • source: Library Journal
      • content:

        March 1, 2020

        DEBUT Author of The Gilded Razor, a corrosive memoir of adolescent drug abuse and one-night stands, Time West Coast editor Lansky has written an eyes-wide-open debut novel about a man named Sam who's moved from New York to Los Angeles and is determined to stay sober and mend a life littered with failed relationships and failed dreams. But he still suffers from what he perceptively describes as "that elemental sense of brokenness, of being wrong, of being bad." Then, at yet another fancy party, he hears about the healing promise of an ancient herb called ayahuasca, administered by a shaman over three days, and after some contrary resistance he's eager to try it. Through the visions that follow, we participate in Sam's painful backstory and come to understand what it is he needs to let go. VERDICT Set within the vividly realized framework of addiction recovery and gay life in America, this remains the story of one man's deep personal struggles while at the same time speaking to and for all the broken people in this world. Some readers may twitch at the long drug trip, but it's a deeply felt journey that many will want to take. [See Prepub Alert, 12/1/19.]--Barbara Hoffert, Library Journal

        Copyright 2020 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

      • premium: True
      • source: Kirkus
      • content:

        April 1, 2020
        Can a weekend with a shaman help a tortured writer find inner peace? Lansky follows The Gilded Razor (2016), a memoir of his misspent youth, with a work of autofiction that recounts the further adventures of a character named Sam with the same backstory. Neither recovery nor writing a memoir nor a move to Los Angeles has proved to be the key to mental health for Sam, who is so filled with self-doubt and self-loathing he can hardly leave the house or entertain a simple hookup. Fortunately, he somehow manages to attend a dinner party where he overhears someone say "He fixes everything that's wrong with you in three days." His rich friend Buck makes arrangements to take a course with the healer in question and offers to take Sam along. At first, he's doubtful. "Is it problematic to work with a white shaman who's like, appropriating the teachings and practices of an indigenous culture for personal gain?" Sam asks his best friend, Kat. "Definitely," she tells him. "But life is a late-capitalist hellscape, so your mystical journey might as well be one, too." The novel is strongest in its humorous moments. Sam's experience on ayahuasca turns out to involve reliving in detail a series of messy relationships with men he loved in the past, which is not all that interesting, but it culminates in an intense spiritual experience which would be more compelling if Lansky had not chosen to call this a novel. Instead, we have an imaginary person healing imaginary damage with an imaginary drug experience, which seems to be a failure of nerve. To make this type of narrative interesting and meaningful, the psychedelic healing experience should be asserted as fact, as Ayelet Waldman did in A Really Good Day. If it's all made up, who cares? This fervent testimony to the healing powers of ayahuasca would have been more powerful if published as nonfiction.

        COPYRIGHT(2020) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

      • premium: True
      • source: Booklist
      • content:

        June 1, 2020
        Lansky's first book, The Gilded Razor (2016), was the unstintingly honest memoir of his teen years as a drug-using New York City prep school student. His first novel stars writer Sam, a gay man and recovering addict who moves from New York to Los Angeles. Sam overhears talk of a shaman who can fix people, so he and a friend skeptically engage the shaman for a three-day ceremony to remove and heal whatever is causing them pain. Readers gain access to Sam's memories, mostly regarding failed relationships and life in New York, while Sam must reckon with his choices and narratives. Of the book's subjects?materialism, addiction, sex, relationships, body issues, and loneliness?the most compelling is Sam's thoughts and beliefs around HIV, which are surprising, nuanced, and compelling. The shamanistic ritual, which provides the structure for this psychic deep dive, is less so. The novel captures a very now portrait of contemporary privileged gay male life, narrated in an authentic voice and painted in a full, ugly-to-beautiful spectrum.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2020, American Library Association.)

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ONE OF THE MOST ANTICIPATED BOOKS OF THE YEAR
Vogue, O, The Oprah Magazine, Parade, Library Journal, Harper's Bazaar and more

"Profound and affecting."—Chloe Benjamin
"Broken People leads us through the winds of time and memory to offer a riveting portrait of transformation. I am better for having read it."—Jamie Lee Curtis
A groundbreaking, incandescent debut novel about coming to grips with the past and ourselves, for fans of Sally Rooney, Hanya Yanagihara and Garth Greenwell
"He fixes everything that's wrong with you in three days."
This is what hooks Sam when he first overhears it at a fancy dinner party in the Hollywood hills: the story of a globe-trotting shaman who claims to perform "open-soul surgery" on emotionally damaged people. For neurotic, depressed Sam, new to Los Angeles after his life in New York imploded, the possibility of total transformation is utterly...
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