The Great Ideas - Tapa blanda

Shortlisted for the 1999 Whitbread First Novel Award. An absorbing mystery story, a How-to book, a tour of the encyclopaedia, an etiquette guide and a history of philosophy – one of the most original and entertaining novels to have come out of America in many years.

The Monroes’ house has been abandoned for as long as Haddie can remember. Before she was born, her sister’s dead body was found on the flagstone path and no one is sure how she fell. Like the House of Atreus, this tragic event will have repercussions which effect all the characters in this strange story and, as Haddie attempts to figure out the clues to the mystery of her sister’s death, The Great Ideas takes the form of an epistemological search. Haddie trawls the encyclopaedia looking for clues, reads Plato, Aristotle, Boethius. Woven into her quest is an abundance of serendipitous details that come at the reader one after the other: about fortune telling, floating paper boats, what it feels like to forget; how to yawn with your mouth closed, flirt, levitate and charm a snake.

Slowly, as it arcs towards its tragic climax, its mixture of curiosity and knowledge will delight anyone with an enquiring mind. A truly original and ground-breaking novel.

The Monroes' house has been abandoned for as long as Haddie can remember. Before she was born, her sister's dead body was found on the flagstone path beneath the balcony at the back, and no one is sure how she fell. As in the House of Atreus that Haddie reads about in the encyclopaedia, this tragic event will have repercussions which affect all the characters in this strange story: the enigmatic bachelor who comes to live in the Monroes' house and has a mysterious past; Mrs Lewis, Haddie's Charm School teacher, who is increasingly attracted to this intriguing stranger; her son Louis Lewis, a practising existentialist, who believes there's no such thing as a lie; and of course Haddie herself, searching for a meaning to her life in the shadow of the death of her sister.

Haddie's attempts to figure out the clues to this mystery take the form of an epistemological search. She trawls the encyclopedia, thinks about tragic fate, reads Plato, Aristotle, Aquinas. She worries about Christian doctrines of original sin. And woven into her quest is an abundance of serendipitous details: about fortune-telling, floating paper boats and what it feels like to forget; how to yawn with your mouth closed, flirt, levitate and charm a snake.

The Great Ideas is a gripping mystery like no other, a story which can also be dipped into through its index. It is an etiquette guide, a 'how-to' book, a survey of classical philosophy, a tour of the A- section of the encyclopaedia, a comedy of manners. As it arcs towards its tragic climax and the dark secret of Haddie's family is revealed, its mixture of curiosity and knowledge will delight anyone with an enquiring mind.