The Postmortal

"The 'postmortals' of the title of this debut novel, set in the near future, have voluntarily undertaken 'the cure,' a form of gene therapy that bestows eternal youth although not immortality: recipients can still die of disease or be killed. But as narrator John Farrell explains, taking the cure is a way of sitting 'in immortality's waiting room.' An odd mixture of satire and dystopian fantasy, this thoughtful novel cleverly explores the consequences of having a long-term lease on life, from the mundane (a woman realizes 'I'm always gonna get my period') to the profound (the world's resources exhausted by an ever-growing population) through a series of short, date-stamped blog posts found in 2090 and considered 'one of the definitive personal records of life in the former United States' during the 60 years after the cure was discovered. The premise is fascinating, and Magary, a comic sports blogger and satirist (Men with Balls), has an eye for the odd, surprising detail that makes science fiction credible. The plot, though, is little more than an extended exploration of the ramifications of the cure, none of them pleasant. While there's a certain pleasure in watching this brave new world unfold on the page, the narrator's passivity becomes tiresome, and the dry, ironic tone is at odds with the dark vision of a future gone amok. (Aug. 30)" Publishers Weekly Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

"As someone who is totally freaked out by the thought of dying, The Postmortal really stood on top of me and peed on my face. It's depiction of the future isn't filled with crappy robots fighting Will Smith. It's filled with eerily realistic portrayals of what the future could look like and does it all in an incredibly entertaining story." Justin Halpern, author of Sh*t My Dad Says

"Magary has created a smartly realized vision of a planet that's hit the skids....Magary is blogger for the sports sites Deadspin and Kissing Suzy Kolber, and the blog format serves him well in the early sections of the novel: It allows him to integrate newspaper articles that set the scene, and he gives [narrator John Farrell] an engaging, quick-witted voice." Kirkus Reviews

Drew Magary is a writer for Deadspin, NBC, Maxim, and Kissing Suzy Kolber. He's also written for GQ, New York Magazine, Rolling Stone, ESPN, Yahoo!, Comedy Central, Playboy, Penthouse, and various other media outlets. His first book, Men with Balls, was released in 2008. This is his first novel. He lives in Maryland with his wife and children.