London-Rose

By Fanny Howe

“People like me who move from city to city tell the story of our failure. We are seeking something that will make us laugh again and feel at home in any neighborhood. For illegal aliens, contract workers, immigrants, the world remains the soul-making machine, where we are given time to purify the quality of our invisible chemistries on our way home.”
—Fanny Howe, London-rose

Written in 1994 when Fanny Howe was doing itinerant work in the UK, London-rose is an early post-work novel that describes the loneliness and confusion of digital life and perpetual motion. Moving from personal narrative to philosophy to poetry, Howe previsages the alienation and malaise of the 21st century workplace. London-rose is a meditation on failure, capitalism, disappearance and force.