A Young Man's Guide to Late Capitalism: A Novel
Apr 2011 · Sold by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
3.5star
4 reviews
Ebook
299
Pages
About this ebook
“A terrific debut novel . . . Mountford’s parable of the voracious global economy reminds me of Graham Greene’s The Quiet American.” —Jess Walter, #1 New York Times-bestselling author of The Cold Millions
On his first assignment for a rapacious hedge fund, Gabriel embarks to Bolivia at the end of 2005 to ferret out insider information about the plans of the controversial president-elect. If Gabriel succeeds, he will get a bonus that would make him secure for life. Standing in his way are his headstrong mother, a survivor of Pinochet’s Chile, and Gabriel’s new love interest, the president’s passionate press liaison. Caught in a growing web of lies and questioning his own role in profiting from an impoverished people, Gabriel sets in motion a terrifying plan that could cost him the love of all those he holds dear.
Set against the stunning mountainous backdrop of La Paz and interspersed with Bolivia’s sad history of stubborn survival, this examines the critical choices a young man makes as his world closes in on him.
“Both of the book’s settings—desperately poor but proud La Paz, the world’s highest-altitude capital, and the world of go-go high finance, a realm about which Mountford clearly knows his stuff—are well rendered. The author is especially good at conveying the visceral and intellectual thrills of stock speculation/manipulation . . . smart, intricate, fast-paced.” —Kirkus Reviews
“One of the most compelling and thought-provoking novels I’ve read in years.” —David Shields, author of Other People
Winner of the Washington State Book Award
On his first assignment for a rapacious hedge fund, Gabriel embarks to Bolivia at the end of 2005 to ferret out insider information about the plans of the controversial president-elect. If Gabriel succeeds, he will get a bonus that would make him secure for life. Standing in his way are his headstrong mother, a survivor of Pinochet’s Chile, and Gabriel’s new love interest, the president’s passionate press liaison. Caught in a growing web of lies and questioning his own role in profiting from an impoverished people, Gabriel sets in motion a terrifying plan that could cost him the love of all those he holds dear.
Set against the stunning mountainous backdrop of La Paz and interspersed with Bolivia’s sad history of stubborn survival, this examines the critical choices a young man makes as his world closes in on him.
“Both of the book’s settings—desperately poor but proud La Paz, the world’s highest-altitude capital, and the world of go-go high finance, a realm about which Mountford clearly knows his stuff—are well rendered. The author is especially good at conveying the visceral and intellectual thrills of stock speculation/manipulation . . . smart, intricate, fast-paced.” —Kirkus Reviews
“One of the most compelling and thought-provoking novels I’ve read in years.” —David Shields, author of Other People
Winner of the Washington State Book Award
Ratings and reviews
3.5
4 reviews
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This book did not in any way live up to the breathless claims on the back jacket I'm a little disappointed in David Shields now (apparently he hates Jonathan Franzen and loves this guy, whose prose is utterly pedestrian and who telegraphs all plot developments without fail).
About the author
While writing about economics in Ecuador for a nonprofit think tank, Peter Mountford noticed his byline read “senior associate” for a hedge fund he’d never heard of. It turned out the think tank was running the hedge fund out of its back office—inspiration for A Young Man’s Guide to Late Capitalism. Mountford has lived in Washington, D.C., New York, and Los Angeles, as well as Scotland, Sri Lanka, Ecuador, and Southern Mexico. His fiction has appeared in Best New American Voices 2008, Boston Review, and Conjunctions.
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