Description
'A sparkling debut . . . a very good plot-driven thriller dressed in a glittery jumpsuit' Guardian
'Brutal, glamorous and genuinely unpredictable, it will blow your mind until the very last page' Stylist
Intoxicating, compulsive and blackly funny, Other People's Clothes is the thrilling novel from Berlin-based American artist Calla Henkel.
Berlin, 2009. Two young art students arrive from New York, desperately hoping to reinvent themselves.
Renting an apartment from an eccentric crime writer, Zoe and Hailey spend their nights twisting through Berlin's club scene and their days hungover. Then inexplicable things start happening in the apartment. Are they being spied on?
Suspecting their landlady of using their lives for her next novel, they decide to beat her at her own game, hosting wild parties that quickly gain notoriety. But as events spiral out of control, they begin to wonder whose story they are living - and how it will end.
'Utterly addictive. I couldn't stop turning the pages' Megan Abbott
About the Author
Calla Henkel is an American writer, playwright, director and artist living between Berlin and Los Angeles. Her debut novel, Other People's Clothes, was a New York Times Book Review 'Editors' Choice'. She has staged plays at Volksbuhne Berlin and the Whitney Museum of Art, and her artistic work with Max Pitegoff has been exhibited in museums and galleries worldwide. She currently operates a theatre in Los Angeles, called New Theater Hollywood. Scrap is her second novel.
Reviews
A sparkling debut . . . this is a very good plot-driven thriller dressed in a glittery jumpsuit. There are laugh-out-loud lines throughout. -- Rhiannon Cosslett * Guardian *
Truly original . . . Brutal, glamorous and genuinely unpredictable, it will blow your mind until the very last page. -- Moya Crockett * Stylist *
Fuelled by a creeping sense of unease, this is a wild, energetic gem of a novel that is entirely involving. -- Fanny Blake * Daily Mail *
Thrilling * Cosmopolitan *
Hugely entertaining * New York Times *
Sharply observed and very funny . . . a worthy addition to the growing canon of outsider writing on Berlin . . . Henkel has an exacting eye for subtle situational humour, and she excels at describing the sorts of characters one encounters in the German capital . . . Calla Henkel cleverly manipulates expectations to build tension until the very end.
-- Jessica Loudis * TLS *The most fun novel I've read this year . . . I kept reading late into the night to find out, enjoying every moment. -- Laura Waddell * The Scotsman *
Darkly funny, psychologically rich and utterly addictive. I couldn't stop turning the pages . . .This is a debut you won't want to miss. -- Megan Abbott
Full of delicious layers . . . I felt drunk reading it. -- Emma Jane Unsworth
Other People's Clothes feels like reading a thriller by your most acerbic friend. -- Rowan Hisayo Buchanan, author of Starling Days
A darkly funny crime thriller . . . Henkel draws up a dazzling and vaudevillian image of the artworld, one that feels all too strange and too real at once. * ArtNet *
Gleefully raunchy * Washington Post *
In Henkel's exciting and visceral debut novel, two New York art students spend a year in Berlin, where they get caught up in a swirl of seedy nightclubs and cut-rate booze. Their toxic entanglement is the true star here, but there are plenty of wild revelations to keep a reader turning the pages * New York Times Book Review (Editor's Choice) *
Book Information
ISBN 9781529357677
Author Calla Henkel
Format Paperback
Page Count 320
Imprint Sceptre
Publisher Hodder & Stoughton
Weight(grams) 230g
Dimensions(mm) 196mm * 130mm * 26mm