The Möbius Book

Quotes

"Catherine Lacey has been climbing up the literary ladder ever since her magnificent debut novel . . . Now comes The Möbius Book, a hybrid fiction-memoir written in the wake of a brutal breakup. Lacey was named as one of Granta’s Best Young American Novelists in 2017, and rightly so – this new one runs the emotional gamut." ―The Telegraph

"Catherine Lacey continues to probe and puncture the membrane between what is real and what is imagined . . . curious and entirely unique." —Jasmine Vojdani, Vulture

"The Möbius Book has no beginning or end but stresses the cycles that punctuate our lives, musing on memory and fiction and the centrality that faith—whatever form that may take—can have. With a heavy emotional thrust and a singular style, this book might resist easy definitions or categories but asks gnawing universal questions on intimacy, security and belief systems that are sure to enthrall many." —Nathan Smith, Observer

"Is it a memoir or a novel or a little of both? Better to categorize Lacey’s latest as its own genre, a category-defining, creative, thought-provoking piece of literature on loss, betrayal, friendships, faith, and more . . . The Möbius Book is full of questions that cannot be fully answered. What is real? What is fake? What is love? Why does suffering exist? Unlike life, there is no beginning or end, just a story that follows its own strange, wild, and mesmerizing pattern. A sui generis work, like no other." —Booklist (starred review)

"A genre-bending book that grapples with the diffuse and uncategorizable enormity of personal loss . . . There are no easy endings in this doubled book, just an infinity loop of questions and possibilities, a twinned bank of pay phones ringing in the night, waiting for someone to answer . . . A literary haunting that will burrow under your skin." —Kirkus Reviews (starred review)

"A hybrid work of fiction and nonfiction, a genre-bending work that traces her relationship with her ex partner and with her former religious faith. Lacey’s work always surprises me and offers something totally new . . . sure to be striking and singular." ―LitHub

"Part novel, part memoir, what might have become a mere separation narrative in another’s hands instead interrogates through its own form whether anything begins or ends in the first place." —John H. Maher, The Millions

"As a massive fan of Lacey’s ambitious alternate-history novel Biography of X, I couldn’t be more thrilled that she’s following it up with something similarly audacious: a half-fictional, half-memoiristic meditation on her own breakup. Leave it to Lacey to put a tantalizing asterisk on her first foray into autobiography. —Conner Reed, Publishers Weekly

"A singular, bewitching work about cycles of life and loss, the patterns of behavior that seem to lock us into who we are, and the quest for a faith that might break us free." —Hua Hsu, author of Stay True

"Catherine Lacey's The Möbius Book is a brilliantly innovative memoir-cum-novel that unsettles and enthralls. When a relationship abruptly shatters, Lacey is left grappling with profound questions about intimacy, safety, and meaning. How well can we ever truly know another person? Can we ever fully know ourselves? As Lacey navigates a winding path of loss and self-discovery, she meditates on spirituality, the illusion of safety, the nature of art, and the transformative power of rupture; the result is a meditation of startling immediacy and depth." ―Meghan O'Rourke, author of The Invisible Kingdom

"A page-turner in both directions, The Möbius Book explores some of the most propulsive questions at the core of human intimacy: What remains unknown (indeed, often unknowable) at the core of the people we know best? And how do we survive this unknowing? This wry, surprising, nimble book--allergic to genre labels, and positively vibrating with insight--achieves what only great art can manage: to be both impossible to imagine, and utterly necessary. I was absolutely spellbound." ―Leslie Jamison, author of Splinters

Awards

• CPL: Chicago Public Library Best of the Best