Sudden Noises From Inanimate Objects : A Novel In Liner Notes

In the tradition of Nabokov's Pale Fire, this novel takes the form of liner notes to the boxed set of the imaginary avant-garde composer/pianist Simon Silber's complete recordings. But is the narrator, Silber's biographer, telling the truth about the composer, his work, or even himself? A funny, fantastic, and supremely intriguing first novel.

Written as liner notes to fictional music, Christopher Miller's uproarious debut novel skewers conventions in a work of high entertainment and imagination. In Sudden Noises from Inanimate Objects, the complete works of the prodigiously cranky composer Simon Silber get their diablolical due from Silber's official biographer -- a man who grows to hate his subject. Not content with simply discussing Silber's odd musical oeuvre -- whose highlights include an hourlong performance of the "Minute Waltz," an etude composed on a telephone keypad, and a transcription of crow caws -- the commentator veers into a delightfully venomous exposé of a musician whose grandiose ambitions far exceed his actual talent.

Christopher Miller graduated from Washington University in St. Louis. Sudden Noises from Inanimate Objects is his first book. He teaches at Bennington College in Vermont.

Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
Imprint: Mariner Books
Distributor: Houghton Mifflin Company
Publication Date: 07-19-2004
Pages: 288
Measurements: 8.00in X 5.00in X 0.75in X 0.57lb