October 2010. Nicholas, 47 year old orientalist, eccentric and eco-warrior' is on an overnight coach journey north to protest against a nuclear missile storage facility in Scotland. His student fellow travellers remind him of his younger self in Hull in the 1980s ? a time spent under the twin clouds of unrequited love and apocalyptic terror. As the bus rumbles through the night, the floodgates of memory open, and Nicholas begins to scrawl episodes from his past life into a notebook. At first these vignettes ? sometimes poignant, sometimes comic, and frequently involving Philip Larkin ? seem almost random. In time, though, a picture emerges: of thwarted love and a fragile, creative mind increasingly at sea in the world. All the Materials for a Midnight Feast is the startling debut novel of a unique, accomplished and utterly beguiling literary voice. In the tradition of the first person narratives, such as Gogol's Diary of a Madman or Grossmith's Diary of a Nobody ? or, more recently, Legend of a Suicide ? it will be adored by anyone whose inner misfit is still alive and kicking. AUTHOR: All the Materials for a Midnight Feast is Gary Dexter's first novel. He is the author of numerous works of non-fiction, including Why Not Catch ? 21?, as well as the Holmesian parody The Oxford Dispoiler. SELLING POINTS: ? A unique bitter-sweet and touching story set in the 1980s, this will appeal to readers of Marina Lewycka, Jonathan Coe and David Vann ? Dexter is a well-known and much admired author
