Shortlisted for the 2016 Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize Globe &amp; Mail "Best Canadian Fiction of 2016" This breakout novel from Giller Prize finalist Michael Helm is a genre-bending work of astonishing vision and a dazzling story of our times. A neuroscientist retreats to a secluded cabin in the woods, intending to blow the whistle on a pharmaceutical company and its creativity drug gone wrong. A failed poet is lured to Rome as a "literary detective" to decode the work of a mysterious Internet poet who seems to write about murders with precise knowledge of private details. On the heels of a life crisis, a virologist discovers her identity has been stolen by a conceptual artist in whose work someone always goes missing. After James is an audacious, masterful novel, told in three connected parts, each gesturing toward a type of genre fiction -- the gothic horror, the detective novel, and the apocalyptic. As the novel unfolds in great cities, remote regions, and deadly borderlands, it weaves connections both explicit and subtle, pulling us deeper into a greater mystery that has come to define our times. Gorgeously written, alive with intelligence and wit, full of adventure and suspense, After James confirms Michael Helm's reputation as one of the most electrifying writers of his generation

After James

Literature & Fiction

Helm, Michael

Literary

MCCLELLAND STEWART

Shortlisted for the 2016 Rogers Writers' Trust Fiction Prize Globe &amp; Mail "Best Canadian Fiction of 2016" This breakout novel from Giller Prize finalist Michael Helm is a genre-bending work of astonishing vision and a dazzling story of our times. A neuroscientist retreats to a secluded cabin in the woods, intending to blow the whistle on a pharmaceutical company and its creativity drug gone wrong. A failed poet is lured to Rome as a "literary detective" to decode the work of a mysterious Internet poet who seems to write about murders with precise knowledge of private details. On the heels of a life crisis, a virologist discovers her identity has been stolen by a conceptual artist in whose work someone always goes missing. After James is an audacious, masterful novel, told in three connected parts, each gesturing toward a type of genre fiction -- the gothic horror, the detective novel, and the apocalyptic. As the novel unfolds in great cities, remote regions, and deadly borderlands, it weaves connections both explicit and subtle, pulling us deeper into a greater mystery that has come to define our times. Gorgeously written, alive with intelligence and wit, full of adventure and suspense, After James confirms Michael Helm's reputation as one of the most electrifying writers of his generation

In Cities of Refuge, Michael Helm’s keenly anticipated new novel, a single act of violence resonates through several lives, connecting closeby fears to distant political terrors. At the story’s centre is the complex, intensely charged relationship between a 28-year-old woman and the father who abandoned her when she was young. One summer night on a side street in downtown Toronto, Kim Lystrander is attacked by a stranger. Thrown deep into turmoil, in the weeks and months that follow, she confronts her fear by returning to the night, in writing, searching for harbingers of the incident, and clues to the identity of her assailant. The attack also torments Kim's father, Harold, an historian of Latin America. As he investigates the crime on his own, the darkest hours from his past revisit him, and he gradually begins to unravel. Entwined in their story are Kim’s ailing mother, Marian; Father André Rowe, whose mission to guide others involves him in a decision with troubling consequences; Rodrigo Cantero, a young Colombian man, living illegally in the city; and Rosemary Yates, a woman whose faith-based belief in the duty to give asylum to any who seek it, even those judged guilty, draws Harold to her, before a fateful choice changes the future for them all. Cities of Refuge is a novel of profound moral tension and luminous prose. It weaves a web of incrimination and inquiry, where mysteries live within mysteries, and stories within stories, and the power to save or condemn rests in the forces of history, and in the realm of our deepest longings. From the Hardcover edition.

Cities of Refuge

Emblem Editions

In Cities of Refuge, Michael Helm’s keenly anticipated new novel, a single act of violence resonates through several lives, connecting closeby fears to distant political terrors. At the story’s centre is the complex, intensely charged relationship between a 28-year-old woman and the father who abandoned her when she was young. One summer night on a side street in downtown Toronto, Kim Lystrander is attacked by a stranger. Thrown deep into turmoil, in the weeks and months that follow, she confronts her fear by returning to the night, in writing, searching for harbingers of the incident, and clues to the identity of her assailant. The attack also torments Kim's father, Harold, an historian of Latin America. As he investigates the crime on his own, the darkest hours from his past revisit him, and he gradually begins to unravel. Entwined in their story are Kim’s ailing mother, Marian; Father André Rowe, whose mission to guide others involves him in a decision with troubling consequences; Rodrigo Cantero, a young Colombian man, living illegally in the city; and Rosemary Yates, a woman whose faith-based belief in the duty to give asylum to any who seek it, even those judged guilty, draws Harold to her, before a fateful choice changes the future for them all. Cities of Refuge is a novel of profound moral tension and luminous prose. It weaves a web of incrimination and inquiry, where mysteries live within mysteries, and stories within stories, and the power to save or condemn rests in the forces of history, and in the realm of our deepest longings.

A man of failing reputation, Toss Raymond lives alone by the South Saskatchewan River, near the drought-ruined farm town of Mayford. It’s the summer of 1988, a year since Toss’s marriage went south, and he made a public spectacle of himself by thrashing the neighbour who he wrongly thought had cuckolded him. Now, as he finishes what might be his last year as a high school teacher and the school board gathers grounds for his dismissal, Toss has taken up with two newcomers in town, and neither association is likely to help him appear any more upright. Here in his “summer of sobering first anniversaries,” in a place under siege from both drought and his friend Dewey’s dark inventions, Toss must decide what he will remain true to: his troublesome desire to follow his heart and his imagination, or his idea of “home” — unhistoried, dying, and likely to leave no trace. A dense, rich, and entirely rewarding novel, The Projectionist is original, moving, and surprisingly funny.

The Projectionist

In the Place of Last Things

A finalist for the Rogers Writers’ Trust Fiction Prize and the Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best Book (Canada and Caribbean region), and a Globe and Mail Notable Book of the Year After his father’s death, Russ Littlebury inherits the task of driving his aunt to her winter home in Arizona. While in Montana, he promises the daughter of a family friend that he will search for her absconded boyfriend, Jack Marks — a man Russ will discover is manipulative, charismatic, and brutal. As Russ travels from the American Southwest to the underworlds of Juarez, Mexico, and back in time from Toronto to Saskatchewan, he confronts his last months with his father and his affair with an open-hearted woman whose convictions entangled them in a small deception, with unforeseen consequences. Fuelled by a sense of responsibility and a growing fascination with the elusive Marks, Russ finds himself unexpectedly face to face with his own past. Michael Helm’s highly acclaimed second novel takes the reader on a breathtaking journey that explores violence, conversion, and loss, and the uneasy consolations we sometimes find in faith and love.

In The Place Of Last Things

For fans of Joshua Cohen and Ben Lerner, After James captures the dystopian strangeness of our current world.A neuroscientist walks out of her life and isolates herself in the woods, intending to blow the whistle on a pharmaceutical company and its creativity drug gone wrong. A recently orphaned graduate school dropout is hired as a "literary detective" to decode the work of a mysterious Internet poet who writes about disappearances and murders with an inexplicably precise knowledge of private details. And a virologist discovers her identity has been stolen by a conceptual artist in whose stories someone always goes missing. Ali, James, and Celia exist in worlds where implausibilities that once belonged to science fiction, ancient superstition, or dystopian visions are real or impending. Set in great cities, remote regions, and deadly borderlands, Michael Helm's groundbreaking novel, After James, is told in three parts, each gesturing toward a different fiction genre: the gothic horror, the detective novel, and the apocalyptic. Science and art become characters, and secrets form, hidden in the codes of genetic sequences, poems, and the patterns of political violence. Part to part, elements repeat―otherworldly weather, disturbing artwork, buried corpses―and amid these echoes, a larger mystery arises, one that joins artifice to nature and fiction to reality, delivering us into the troubling wonder of the present world.

After James Lib/E

Blackstone Publishing

A neuroscientist intends to blow the whistle on a pharmaceutical company and its creativity drug gone wrong. A recently orphaned graduate school dropout is hired to decode the work of a mysterious Internet poet who writes about disappearances and murders with an inexplicably precise knowledge of private details. And a virologist discovers her identity has been stolen by a conceptual artist in whose stories someone always goes missing. Ali, James, and Celia exist in worlds where implausibilities that once belonged to science fiction, ancient superstition, or dystopian visions are real or impending.

Blackstone Audiobooks

A man of failing reputation, Toss Raymond lives alone by the South Saskatchewan River, near the drought-ruined farm town of Mayford. Itâs the summer of 1988, a year since Tossâs marriage went south, and he made a public spectacle of himself by thrashing the neighbour who he wrongly thought had cuckolded him. Now, as he finishes what might be his last year as a high school teacher and the school board gathers grounds for his dismissal, Toss has taken up with two newcomers in town, and neither association is likely to help him appear any more upright. Here in his âsummer of sobering first anniversaries,â in a place under siege from both drought and his friend Deweyâs dark inventions, Toss must decide what he will remain true to: his troublesome desire to follow his heart and his imagination, or his idea of âhomeâ â unhistoried, dying, and likely to leave no trace. A dense, rich, and entirely rewarding novel, The Projectionist is original, moving, and surprisingly funny.

The projectionist: A novel

Douglas&McIntyre

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Helm, Michael. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Helm, Michael

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Helm, Michael. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

After James

After James

Cities of Refuge

Cities of Refuge

The Projectionist

In the Place of Last Things

In The Place Of Last Things

After James Lib/E

After James

The projectionist: A novel