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One More Thing: Stories and Other Stories (Vintage Contemporaries) - Softcover

Novak, B. J.

 
9780804169783: One More Thing: Stories and Other Stories (Vintage Contemporaries)
Softcover
ISBN 10: 0804169780 ISBN 13: 9780804169783
Verlag: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group, 2015

Inhaltsangabe

New York Times Bestseller

A startlingly original debut from the actor, writer, director, and executive producer hailed as “a gifted observer of the human condition and a very funny writer capable of winning that rare thing: unselfconscious, insuppressible laughter” (The Washington Post).

A boy wins a $100,000 prize in a box of Frosted Flakes—only to discover that claiming the winnings might unravel his family. A woman sets out to seduce motivational speaker Tony Robbins—turning for help to the famed motivator himself. A new arrival in Heaven, overwhelmed with options, procrastinates over a long-ago promise to visit his grandmother. We meet Sophia, the first artificially intelligent being capable of love, who falls for a man who might not be ready for it himself; a vengeance-minded hare, obsessed with scoring a rematch against the tortoise who ruined his life; and post-college friends who try to figure out how to host an intervention in the era of Facebook.  Along the way, we learn why wearing a red T-shirt every day is the key to finding love, how February got its name, and why the stock market is sometimes just . . . down.

Finding inspiration in questions from the nature of perfection to the icing on carrot cake, One More Thing has at its heart the most human of phenomena: love, fear, hope, ambition, and the inner stirring for the one elusive element just that might make a person complete. Across a dazzling range of subjects, themes, tones, and narrative voices, the many pieces in this collection are like nothing else, but they have one thing in common: they share the playful humor, deep heart, sharp eye, inquisitive mind, and altogether electrifying spirit of a writer with a fierce devotion to the entertainment of the reader.

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Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

B.J. Novak is perhaps best known for his work as a writer, actor, director, and executive producer on NBC’s Emmy Award-winning comedy series The Office. He is also known for his stand up comedy performances and his roles in motion pictures such as Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds and Disney’s Saving Mr. Banks. He is the author of The Book With No Pictures, a #1 New York Times Bestseller, and his stories have been published in The New Yorker and featured on This American Life. 

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Excerpted from the Hardcover edition


Chapter 1

No One Goes to Heaven to See Dan Fogelberg

Tim, nine years old, leaned next to his grandmother as she lay in her hospital bed. He gently kissed her face around the tubes in her nose.

“I love you, Nana,” said Tim. “I promise I’ll visit you in heaven.”

The next day, Tim’s grandmother died.

Sixty-six years after that, Tim died.

The first thing Tim did when he got to heaven was look for his wife.

He was so anxious and excited to find her that he couldn’t focus on anything else—not the fact that he had died, not the fact that he was in heaven, and certainly not his grandmother.

“Is Lynn here?” he asked everyone he met. “Yes,” they said, but he kept asking. “Is Lynn here?” “Yes,” they laughed, “you’ll see her in like two seconds!”

And there she was, standing beside a park bench in a spring dress, looking at the same time the way she looked when he had known her last, at the hour of her death just under a year ago, and the way she looked at her very most beautiful, the day he married her, when she was twenty-two and he was twenty-five.

It was a far deeper and sharper moment of first love than the first first moment of first love, because now, not only was he falling in love, but he was falling in love with someone he loved; and while the first time, he also believed he’d be with her forever, he was too young to consider what forever meant.

Now here he was, truly, on the first day of forever.

He kissed her for an eternity, which was fine, because heaven had eternities to burn. Then he kissed her for another.

“It wouldn’t have been heaven without you.”

He took her hand in his, and they strolled out of the park together.

“Oh, and you gotta remind me,” said Tim as they walked. “One of these days I have to visit my grandma. Remind me, okay?”

“Of course!” said Lynn. “I would love to meet her.”

But first, they looked up their friends, the ones they had shared for the main length of their life together. They brought to each house a bottle of wine that never emptied, and they visited everyone for hours, laughing late into the night, reminiscing and gossiping about who had died and who hadn’t. Then they’d wake up early the next morning, make coffee and French toast, and talk about the friends they had visited and whether or not heaven had changed them.

Next they went to see Tim’s parents, who were doing very well and were very happy to see both of them.

“Have you visited Nana yet?” asked his parents.

Not yet, said Tim, but soon.

Next, they visited Lynn’s mother.

“You know your father’s here,” Lynn’s mother told Lynn. Lynn was surprised to hear this. “It would be the right thing to visit him.”

Tim had never met Lynn’s father, but he had heard all about their relationship. Her father abandoned her family when she was thirteen and only saw her once more, when he showed up unannounced at her high school graduation and tried to reconcile, ruining the day for her. She had retaliated by rebuffing him publicly and rudely. She did not want to see him at all, but she could tell it was the right thing to do, and heaven was the kind of place that made you want to do the right thing.

“We’ll go together,” said Tim. “It’ll be fine.”

Lynn’s father opened the door to his oversized condominium with a huge grin. Of course he would have a condominium in heaven.

“Remember at your high school graduation?” he said. “When you told me to go to hell?”

He smiled like he had been looking forward to saying that line for a long time.

“What a jerk,” she said after they left. “Why did they let him in?”

“He must have changed,” said Tim.

“And then changed back?”

“Maybe,” said Tim. “Who knows how things work here?”

“Well, maybe this is better, because I get to feel mercy, or something. Or close that chapter. Or whatever. I did it. You know?”

“That’s a good attitude,” said Tim. “And it was the right thing to do. Now you can enjoy heaven with a clear conscience.”



The next day, Tim called Nana.

“Hello?”

“Nana?”

“Who’s this?”

“Nana! It’s Tim!”

“Tim who?”

“Tim Donahue!”

“Eliza’s husband? Oh.” She sounded unhappy. “Hi.”

“No, Tim Junior. Eliza’s son. Timmy! Your grandson!”

“Timmy! Oh, goodness—Timmy, you died? You’re just a little boy!”

“No, Nana, I’m all grown up! I’m in my seventies now. Was.”

“Oh, thank goodness. I still pictured you as a little boy! How did everything wind up?”

“Well . . . there’s a lot to cover, Nana! We want to come visit you. I have a wife now—I want you to meet her!”

“Oh, that’s wonderful! Wonderful. It will be so wonderful to see you both!”

“When’s good?” said Tim.

“When? Oh. Hm.” Nana paused. “I have a bunch of stuff next week. I’m seeing some friends, and there’s a couple concerts I want to see . . . How about next weekend? The weekend after this coming weekend, I mean.”

“We would love that. How about Sunday, for dinner? Like old times?”

“Huh?”

“Like the Sunday dinners you used to make us, when we were kids.”

“Oh. Sure, we could do that. Or we could order in. Lot of options. Let’s decide closer to then, okay?”

“Okay, Nana. I love you. I’m so happy I’m going to get to see you!”

“Me, too. I love you, too. See you next Sunday. But not this one—the next one. Bye now.”

“Nana sounded odd,” Tim said after he hung up. “Or something.”

“Maybe she’s upset that you didn’t get in touch with her before?”

“I don’t know,” said Tim. “It’s hard to tell that stuff over the phone. And also, there’s a lot to do here, you know? I hadn’t seen you, I hadn’t explored heaven—it’s not like anyone’s going anywhere . . .”

“It’ll all be better on Sunday,” said Lynn. “When we see her.”

“You’re right,” Tim agreed.

On Sunday, Tim called to confirm.

“Nana! It’s Tim. Just confirming we’ll see you tonight? I’m bringing my wife, Lynn.”

“Who?”

“Lynn, my wife. You’re going to love her.”

“Who’s this?”

“Tim, your grandson. Timmy.”

“Timmy! Oh, Tim, gosh, tonight? I’m so sorry, tonight won’t work. Can we do next weekend?”

“Sure,” said Tim. “I guess.”

“Let me look here. . . . There’s something I have to be at on Saturday. And then I’m actually checking out some shows next week—actually, is two weeks okay? A week from next Friday? Can you pencil that in?”

“Sure,” said Tim.

“Perfect. I’ll see you next Friday! A week from, I mean.”

“Okay, Nana. I love you.”

“I...

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Verlag
Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Erscheinungsdatum
2015
Sprache
Englisch
ISBN 10 
0804169780
ISBN 13 
9780804169783
Einband
Taschenbuch
Anzahl der Seiten
288
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