Waiting for the Electricity

By Christina Nichol

Book Overview

But there's one man in Georgia who remains unseduced by corruption, unfazed by nostalgia, and unable to abandon chivalry, no matter how antiquated a notion it may be. This man is Slims Achmed Makashvili, a humble maritime lawyer and the hero of this brilliant novel.

When Slims discovers an application for an American small business internship program sponsored by Hillary Clinton, he knows that he has found his calling. In his letters to Senator Clinton, Slims dreams of bringing efficiency, opportunity, and the American dream to his homeland, even as his friends and relatives embrace decadence, lethargy, and a staggering array of unsavory business practices. But when he finally gets to America--specifically to utopian San Francisco, where the streets are paved with quinoa--Slims sees what reform and progress look like up close. And suddenly, his loud, bickering family and his anguished, joyful country no longer seem so grim.

A gleeful picaresque, a visionary satire, and a work of extraordinary empathy and imagination, Waiting for the Electricity is a marvelously imaginative debut novel.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1468306863
• ISBN13: 9781468306866
• Release Date: June 2014
• Publisher: Overlook Press
• Length: 332 Pages
• Weight: 1.32 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.2" x 6.1" x 9.1"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher