The character who comes the closest to being Shriver’s protagonist is Florence’s son, Willing, 13 when the novel opens in 2029. The hard-to-handle cousin, Jarred, is a farmer upstate.

Only his granddaughter Florence hasn’t really made it – she works at a homeless shelter and lives with Esteban, who works in an old folks’ home.

“Great Grand Man” has an old-style fortune with its roots in manufacturing his daughter, Enola, is a prominent author and his son-in-law, Lowell, is an economist at Georgetown.

To begin with, the Mandibles are a prosperous Manhattanite bunch. Your head may be spinning, because the details of finance are more abstruse than nuclear exchange, asteroid impacts or the second coming, but as she follows her characters through sufferings and accommodations, Shriver manages to make her case – that civilisation is a delicate network and what we have, even if that is only toilet paper and socks, is precious. The formerly wealthy, who had installed themselves in France, must now go home because the almighty dollar is worth nothing, replaced as the international currency by the “bancor”. The devastation in The Mandibles is monetary – its effect is to destroy the US economy so completely that the impoverished hordes are fleeing to Mexico. This event is part of the 50th Brighton Festival, 2016.T here are plenty of zippy novels about the end of the world, but Lionel Shriver has had a different idea. Copies of the book will also be available to purchase on the night. Order your copy of The Mandibles by Lionel Shriver from the Guardian Bookshop today and save 20%. We Need to Talk about Kevin won the Orange Prize for Fiction, and was later adapted for an award-winning film directed by Lynne Ramsey and starring Tilda Swinton.įor any access enquiries/bookings please get in touch with the Brighton Festival ticket office on 01273 709709. Shriver is the author of twelve novels, including The Post-Birthday World, Big Brother and The New Republic. From the author of We Need to Talk About Kevin, this is a dark, witty and frightening dystopia about a nation in decline. At its centre are three generations of a once wealthy family which must first contend with the loss of its fortune, and then learn how to survive as America’s sovereign debt soars and the economy spirals into dysfunction, wiping out the savings of millions of American families. Orange prize-winning writer Lionel Shriver’s new novel, The Mandibles: A Family, 2029 -2047, is set during a fiscal crisis in near-future America.

The mandibles by lionel shriver