Big Brother

Big Brother
Lionel Shriver

The new novel from the Orange Prize-winning author of We Need to Talk About Kevin.When Pandora picks up her older brother Edison at her local Iowa airport, she literally doesn’t recognize him. The once slim, hip New York jazz pianist has gained hundreds of pounds. What happened?Soon Edison’s slovenly habits, appalling diet, and know-it-all monologues are driving Pandora and her fitness-freak husband Fletcher insane. After the brother-in-law has more than overstayed his welcome, Fletcher delivers his wife an ultimatum: it’s him or me.Rich with Shriver’s distinctive wit and ferocious energy, Big Brother is about fat: why we overeat and whether extreme diets ever really work. It asks just how much sacrifice we’ll make to save single members of our families, and whether it’s ever possible to save loved ones from themselves.

COPYRIGHT (#ulink_85c30528-d93a-592f-91bf-d55e0a7be5ce)

The Borough Press

An imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk (http://www.harpercollins.co.uk)

First published by HarperCollinsPublishers 2013

Copyright © Lionel Shriver 2013

Cover design by Stuart Bache © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2017

Cover photographs © Shutterstock.com (http://shutterstock.com)

Lionel Shriver asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780007271108

Ebook Edition © 2014 ISBN: 9780007481651

Version: 2017-04-06

To Greg—who was unfailingly, improbably glad for anything good that ever happened to me, and in the face of whose drastic, fantastic, astonishing life any fiction pales.

One in Three Would Trade Year of Life for Ideal Body

Daily Telegraph headline, 24 March 2011

Table of Contents

Cover (#u02f6f7a1-4bac-5ffc-ae59-2bd70d84bec2)

Title Page (#u8c037366-fe54-54b6-8259-299f6f3f1274)

Copyright (#ufc3be9fa-88f0-5a8b-99bd-5f2bad4a872c)

Dedication (#ucd49e03a-5089-5e04-92e7-b6aeac547f6c)

Epigraph (#u64310ed2-d8bc-5b10-bf78-1383ab3fedf5)

I: Up (#ub191c03f-1296-5804-a316-a766725188cf)

Chapter One (#udd104efe-f5a3-5f30-a302-75b8ef9c97b3)

Chapter Two (#u13db47f0-d52e-54a9-9d2e-54157c498e91)

Chapter Three (#u3645cea5-32a2-55c7-aacb-a6faa504af79)

Chapter Four (#uf7e07e0e-d07a-5148-adfe-8602eddb24ff)

Chapter Five (#u5d8c939b-943f-56e5-8c38-43a5719ba2e8)

Chapter Six (#u333f3cfc-ef02-5ffc-b110-cb16aa7da283)

Chapter Seven (#u467bde35-970b-574e-8655-7fc955aa64e7)

Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Ten (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Eleven (#litres_trial_promo)

II: Down (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter One (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Two (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Three (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Four (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Five (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Six (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Seven (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Eight (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Nine (#litres_trial_promo)