Grandmother Divided by Monkey Equals Outer Space
Grandmother Divided by Monkey Equals Outer Space
Nora Chassler
Paperback
New York City, 1982. The Martians – Carrie, Eli, their mother Viv and her teenage boyfriend, Arnie – live in a one-bedroom apartment on the Upper West Side. Viv smokes marijuana continually, laying out her bizarre version of reality to anyone who will listen. Eleven year-old Carrie’s budding OCD manifests in attention to detail at the expense of the big picture. Her angry older brother Eli just wants to make it to a showing of The Shining that isn’t sold out.
Around the corner – ‘above the smaller dry cleaners’ – the psychic Miss Rosa’s neon rose glows above the street. Keener on recounting the past than predicting the future, Miss Rosa (a.k.a. Phoebe Curtis) befriends the Martians one by one, and shares a part of her story with each of them – a story that resonates disturbingly with their own lives. But the Martians have other things to worry about: can Carrie afford a Red Devil costume for the Halloween parade? Who really has the longest fry? And how will Viv buy pot and pay the rent?
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Imprint: Valley Press
Published: March 2015
ISBN: 9781908853455
Catalogue no: VP0065
Page count: 160
Trim size: 198 x 129 mm
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Praise for Grandmother Divided by Monkey Equals Outer Space:
“Nora Chassler’s extraordinary Grandmother Divided by Monkey Equals Outer Space breaks all moulds ... it is a triumphant vindication of the edgy, eccentric demotic as a compelling narrative voice.”
— William Boyd, The Guardian
“Somewhere between Nabokov and Bret Easton Ellis ... Chassler’s characters elicit real emotion. Their stories grip you to the last and leave you wanting more.”
— Chris Dolan, The Herald
“I keep recommending this book to you and you still haven't read it. Just do it. It's my favourite New York novel. EVERY SENTENCE IS INTERESTING.”
— Rónán Hession, Twitter
About the author
Nora Chassler was born in Madison, Wisconsin, in 1972, and grew up in New York City. She is the author of two novels, Miss Thing (Two Ravens Press, 2010) and Grandmother Divided by Monkey Equals Outer Space (Valley Press, 2015), both currently awaiting reissue. Three genre-bending publications have since followed, all with Valley Press – a collection of ‘fragments, pensées and table-talk’ titled Madame Bildungsroman’s Optimistic Worldview (2017), an epic poem, The Minnow Would Be Lost (2020), and the I Ching-inspired The Noracle (2025). She lives on the Scottish coast.