Losing It
A darkly funny novel about
madness in many forms,
following the antics of a
professor of English whose
pivate life threatens to
unhinge everything.
Finalist Ottawa Book
Award 2003
Globe and Mail Notable Book 2001
Losing It is "an exhilarating roller-coaster ride that will have
readers shrieking with delighted laughter and appreciation....
The plot here is occasionally so slapstick that it simply should
not work. How many times can a character realistically fall down,
sneak past discovery or evade disaster? But amazingly, and a real
tribute to Cumyn's talent as a narrative maestro, this novel does
work, engaging the reader completely and convincingly, with a
wonderful temerity. Losing It is ultimately a brilliant tour de
force that pushes past the boundaries of expectation and
predictability."
Aritha van Herk, The Globe and Mail
"Here are all the basic ingredients
for a fairly typical academic comedy
of errors à la Kingsley Amis or David
Lodge... But Cumyn's comedy is both
sadder and more sinewy than his
material suggests. As each chapter
shifts to a different character's
perspective, the reader experiences a
kind of emotional variegation:
a bold stripe of comedy yields to a paler,
frailer shade of poignancy to a sudden
black swath of outright distress. One
minute the reader gets the low physical
comedy of Bob... and rolls her eyes in
grudging amusement; the very next page
she sees Lenore wandering unsupervized
from the nursing home, where a distraught
Julia has had to commit her, to a nearby
waterfall. Only her own immense dignity
forestalls utter panic, and only immense
luck staves off disaster. 'Tragical-comical-
historical-pastoral,' as Shakespeare put it."
Annabel Lyon, The Ottawa Citizen