The Way Inn (38 page)
Authors: Will Wiles
James Bridle and I had several useful conversations about conferences, stock photography and network unreality. And he gave me “wet polymers.” More prosaic information was gleaned from
Meetings and Incentive Travel
magazine and the Economist Intelligence Unit's 2009 report
The Austere Traveller
, some of which is quoted in Part One. My former employers Christopher Turner and Daren Newton were kind enough to grant me a three-month sabbatical, and indirectly contributed to research by putting me in a lot of hotels. James Smythe and Lee Rourke read an early draft and gave me helpful notes.
The seed of the idea probably came from Rem Koolhaas's essay “Junkspace.” J. G. Ballard, the greatest writer of the twenty-first century, was here firstâthe swimming pool is for him.
WILL WILES
is the author of the novel
Care of Wooden Floors
and is an architecture and design journalist in Great Britain. His writing has appeared in
Cabinet
magazine,
New Statesman
, and other UK publications. He lives in London.
Discover great authors, exclusive offers, and more at
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.
The Way Inn
“Dark and clever. . . .
The Way Inn
is Terence Conran meets H. P. Lovecraft. It is Bulgakov staged in the Tate, Kafka as a new Ikea furniture range. Wiles writes beautiful prose, stages exquisitely painful set-piece scenes of high comedy, and in Neil Double has created a John Self for the Marriott generation.
The Way Inn
is funny, clever, and thrilling, its central conceit disturbing enough to demand that you read it outside, if you can.”
â
The Guardian
(London)
“An ingenious and smartly funny novel.”
â
Daily Mail
(London)
“I devoured this impressive and enthralling novel. If you ever explored hotel corridors or played in hotel lifts as a child, be glad it wasn't in this hotel.”
âAlison Moore,
                                                                   Â
author of the Man Booker Prize finalist
The Lighthouse
“Utterly wonderful. Reminds me of
The Man Who Was Thursday
. And not much out there does.”
âJ. Robert Lennon,
                          Â
author of Happyland (via Twitter)
Care of Wooden Floors
“This darkly humorous novel from UK journalist Wiles involves a nameless protagonist whose eight days of house-sitting turn out to be a lot more hassle than he bargained for. A freelance copywriter in London does his old university friend, Oskar, now a classical musician, a big favor by staying in his ânice flat' located in an unspecified and dour Slavic city. Oskar is a âborderline obsessive-compulsive' who leaves very specific instructions on a number of notes posted throughout the flat, including not only the care of cats Shossy and Stravvy but, of greater importance, that of the expensive French oak floors. Oskar, in LA to deal with divorcing his wife, intends to return soon to his âisland of perfection.' Unfortunately, the befuddled protagonist is a hapless caretaker; he lets one of Oskar's cats die (via piano lid) and, perhaps worse, he spills red wine on the floor. âBatface,' the flat's bellicose cleaning lady, is no help rescuing the precious floorboard. The narrator is pleased to find that Oskar has a âhuman' side when he uncovers his hidden porn stash, but the maintenance of the wooden floors soon takes a horrid turn. A strikingly original debut.”
â
Publishers Weekly
(starred review)
“If you are a fan of Kafka, you should enjoy this novel, which is reminiscent of
The Metamorphosis
.”
â
Kirkus Reviews
“Thrilling, darkly comic disaster [is] lurking in every movement, wine bottle, and floorboard.”
âDaily Beast
“This novel has everything I look for: line by line the sentences are a pleasure, page by page the story enthralls, and as a whole, the novel is expertly constructed, each precisely cut plank snapping perfectly into place. Clever, funny, creepy, atmospheric, and very entertaining. I realize that's a lot of adjectives, but read the book and you'll see.”
âCharles Yu, author of
                                        Â
How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe
“Funny, beguiling, and quietly profound . . . a wonderfully well-crafted debut.”
â
Times Literary Supplement
(London)
“If, like me, you've ever thought that your productivity and creativity would explode if only you could get organized, let this be a (morbidly funny) wake-up call. . . . A precisely written debut from one who knows the value of letting loose.”
â
Minneapolis Star Tribune
“Guffaw-out-loud moments . . . married to the horrified recognition that provokes empathy. A very funny novel provoking schadenfreude and belly laughs.”
â
The Independent
(London)
“Highly idiosyncratic, well-written, with a vivid sense of placeâand weirdly compelling.”
âMichael Frayn, author of
Skios
and
Headlong
“One of the funniest and cleverest books of the year. . . .
Care of Wooden Floors
reads like a farce directed by Alfred Hitchcock, and the novel's denouement will surprise even the most jaded readers.”
â
Washington Independent Review of Books
“
Fawlty Towers
crossed with Freud.”
â
Daily Telegraph
(London)
“One of the most brilliant and entertaining literary debuts this year. The precision of his language and the care with which he delineates the characters and their environment is nothing less than astounding.”
â
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
“A nicely turned satire on the notion that the path to spiritual contentment lies in a pristine set of polished wooden floorboards. . . .
Care of Wooden Floors
indicates that Wiles has an eye for beauty, but an even more impressive eye for ugliness. It's a novel full of impeccably stylish writing.”
â
The Guardian
(London)
“This is a terrific first novel, written with a very engaging deadpan wit and an understated sense of the absurd.”
âThe Times
(London)
“This novel feels like a blend of Thomas Pynchon's “Entropy,' John Cheever's “The Swimmer,' Edgar Allan Poe's “The Tell-Tale Heart,' and any of Robert Coover's stories that push the limits of realistic actions.”
âNorth American Review
Care of Wooden Floors
COVER DESIGN BY JARROD TAYLOR
COVER PHOTOGRAPH © ROBERT DANT / ALAMY
First published in slightly different form in Great Britain in 2014 by Fourth Estate.
THE WAY INN
. Copyright © 2014 by Will Wiles. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.
FIRST U.S. EDITION
ISBN 978-0-06-233610-1
EPub Edition September 2014 ISBN 9780062336118
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