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Fiction Marriage & Divorce

Mount Pleasant

by (author) Don Gillmor

Publisher
Random House of Canada
Initial publish date
Feb 2014
Category
Marriage & Divorce, Literary, City Life
  • Paperback / softback

    ISBN
    9780307360731
    Publish Date
    Feb 2014
    List Price
    $19.95

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Description

In Don Gillmor's comedic new novel about a troubled marriage in our monetarily troubled times, the financial delusions of the middle class run smack into the orchestrators of our financial collapse.
In middle age, debt has become the most significant relationship in Harry Salter's life. He was born to wealthy parents in leafy and privileged Rosedale, at a time when the city was still defined by its WASP elite. But nothing in life has turned out the way Harry was led to expect. He's unsure of his place in society, his marriage is crumbling, his son is bordering on estranged, and on top of it all his father is dying.
As he sits at his father's bedside, Harry inevitably daydreams about his inheritance. A couple of his father's millions would rescue him from his ballooning debt--maybe even save his marriage. But when the will is read, all that's left for Harry is $4200. Dale Salter's money is gone. Out of desperation and disbelief, Harry starts to dig into what happened to the money. As he follows a trail strewn with family secrets and unsavory suspicions, he discovers not only that old money has lost its grip and new money taken on an ugly hue, but that his whole existence has been cast into shadow by the weight of his expectations.

About the author

Don Gillmor’s most recent book To the River won the 2019 Governor General’s Literary Award for non-fiction. He is the author of a two-volume history of Canada, Canada: A People’s History, which won the Libris Award, and two other books of non-fiction, The Desire of Every Living Thing and I Swear by Apollo. He has written three critically acclaimed novels – Kanata, Mount Pleasant and Long Change – as well as nine books for children, two of which were nominated for a Governor General’s Award. He has won twelve National Magazine Awards, including the Outstanding Achievement Award. He lives in Toronto with his wife and two children.

Don Gillmor's profile page

Editorial Reviews

NATIONAL BESTSELLER
"A wisely, darkly, deeply, hysterically funny novel. I could have read a thousand pages of Harry Salter's insights into the absurd and terrifying enlightenments of middle age." Linden MacIntyre, prize-winning author of Why Men Lie and The Bishop's Man
"Don Gillmor's beautifully written Mount Pleasant is a brilliant comic autopsy of Toronto, the financial tsunami, and a generation--or 2. You're going to be absolutely wild about Harry!" --Linda Svendsen, author of Sussex Drive

User Reviews

Around TO in the blackest of moods

If I saw Harry Salter, the grumpy and bitter anti-hero of this novel, in real life, I'd cross the street to avoid him. Safely ensconced in pages, though, he's a crabby, acid-tongued delight, and his kvetching about everything from bicycle couriers and ugly condominiums to his wife and mother are hardly sensitive or diplomatic, but they sure are memorable!

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