The Sensationist

A young man arrives in a cold northern city that is strange to him and begins a job that is demanding and stressful. When he is not working he plunges into a life of drink, drugs and casual sex in a desperate attempt to find pleasure and distraction in physical sensations. Then he encounters a young woman unlike anyone he has known and by whom he becomes obsessed. Her isolation and melancholy both appeal to him and make impossible a stable relationship between them. And she has a child. His selfishness and her vulnerability can have only one outcome and it is a tragic one. Hovering between reality, dream, and memory, this short cryptic novel is a disturbing exploration of loneliness, selfishness and desperation.