- Livre broché
- Occasion

Vendeur : St Vincent de Paul of Lane County, Eugene, OR, Etats-UnisSt Vincent de Paul of Lane County
Vendeur AbeBooks depuis 11 mars 2014
Etat: Occasion - Moyen
EUR 4,52
Quantité disponible : 1 disponible
Ajouter au panierA propos de cet article
PLEASE NOTE: FORMER LIBRARY BOOK. IT MAY HAVE IDENTIFYING STAMPS, MARKS, STICKERS, ETC. COVER SHOWS SOME GENERAL WEAR, SUCH AS SCRATCHES, RUBBING AND SMALL TEARS. Former Library book. paperback 100% of proceeds go to charity! Acceptable reading copy with obvious signs of use, wear, and/or cosmetic issues. Item is complete and remains readable despite notable condition issues.
N° de réf. du vendeur W-004-3551
- Titre
- The Swap: A Novel
- Auteur
- Moore, Antony
- Éditeur
- Delta
- Année de publication
- 2008
- État de l'article
- Acceptable
- Reliure
- Couverture souple
- Langue
- anglais
- ISBN à 10 chiffres
- 0385342349
- ISBN à 13 chiffres
- 9780385342346
« Synopsis » peut appartenir à une autre édition de cet ouvrage.
Extrait
The sigh had become a feature of the man. And when he sighed it signified no special existential despair, only an acknowledgement of the fact that another day had come and the coffee that he was drinking was no better than it had been yesterday. He sat in unsplendid isolation at the counter of his shop, his back to the rows and rows of stands that ran away from him toward the front door. Each stand was thick with plastic, and in the harsh strip lighting it was hard to see that each piece of plastic contained a comic.
“All right, Harvey? Make us one, I’m freezing.”
How long had it been from his own arrival until Josh tapped him playfully on one shoulder while walking the other way? The coffee cup was still warm in his hands. He looked up. “You’re late.” He hadn’t actually checked the time but he liked to start each working day by registering a complaint, preferably to Josh.
“What’s up? We open, are we?”
“Of course we are open. We keep business hours, or at least, I do.”
“Well, the sign doesn’t say Open.” Josh went back to the door and turned a rather grubby picture of Thor, God of Thunder, saying Closed to an identical one of him saying Open. “You wonder why we don’t get any customers, but you have to turn the sign round, Harvey.” Giggling, Josh made his way behind the counter and through into the back room where they kept the coffee. “You might have been swamped with customers by now if you’d remembered that simple rule.” Josh’s voice was muffled by the sound of water being run into a kettle.
But not muffled enough.
“Fuck off.” Harvey rose from his seat at the counter and moved to the front of the shop to avoid Josh’s voice, which now began painfully to accompany music on Xfm from the back room. He opened the door and walked out into a February wind that made him lift his shoulders and narrow his eyes.
If only.
Some days it was worse than usual, the memories, the wondering. It had never left him. Ever since he moved from Cornwall, made his way to the big city, he’d sort of expected it to go, to withdraw into some back room of his mind, but every day it had seemed stronger. He breathed deep of the icy air and contemplated the empty street. Few customers here, no passing trade. The sigh was a part of him, as much as the hunch of the shoulder and the reach for the cigarettes from the inside pocket of his denim jacket. He struggled to light up in the hectic wind, failed, swore vaguely, and made his way back into the shop to sit once more behind the counter on one of the two high stools. After a few moments he stabbed out the butt with a hard vicious motion.
“Turn that shit down, will you, Josh!”
“OK, Harvey, OK. You don’t need to get nasty.” And Harvey put his head in his hands and felt the way his hair was disappearing, leaving him: abandoning ship.
“What I could have done.” It was one-thirty and the Queen’s Head was full. But they had been there for over an hour and had a prime seat. It was a pub without noticeable character or appeal. But it was located midway between one set of office blocks and another and had accepted the benefits of fortune without complaint. It was also the closest place to get a drink to Inaction Comix.
“What might have been.” Harvey was making a song of it, an ironic little play for Josh’s benefit. What else could he do? He’d told the story too many times.
“Yeah.” Josh’s mind and his glasses were on the fruit machine and more specifically the T-shirt of the pretty blonde leaning against it. “Yeah, you could have been in Tahiti or something.”
“New York.” Harvey didn’t like his fantasy to be made commonplace. No lottery winner’s confusion for him. He knew what he’d have done. “A little coffeehouse downtown with murals on the walls, Spider-Man, the Fantastic Four, you know, classy but trashy, and I’d still have collected but just for fun.”
“Yeah, cool. A Superman One would have got you that, no problem.” Josh smiled hopefully at the blonde who turned away to her less desirable friend with a grimace. “You could have been a contender.” He put on a comedy-Brando to cover his not unanticipated failure and tried to catch the friend’s eye.
“Yeah, I could have been a contender”—Harvey pulled on his third pint—“but Bleeder is the contender now. He’s out there somewhere with a Superman One. And good luck to him.”
The blackboards above the bar described the almost risibly limited selection of foodstuffs that the pub had to offer. He examined them with the eyes of one who has read them before but seeks distractions.
“Maybe he’s sold it, but maybe he chucked it away the day after you gave it to him.” Josh found his attention caught, as it often was, by the topic of Harvey’s loss.
“No, he hasn’t sold it: They only come on the market every blue moon and it’s always in the press when they do. I’ve sat and watched its value increase for twenty years. Every year I look in Overstreet and every year it’s another few thousand dollars. A few thousand a year for twenty years . . . So yeah, maybe he chucked it out with the trash. Or maybe he just likes reading it too much to part with it.”
“What did you swap it for again?” Josh wasn’t usually malicious; that’s why Harvey liked him, or tolerated him at least. He picked up his pint and finished it in a long mouthful.
“Fuck off,” Harvey said.
“So, have you decided about going to the reunion?” Josh was struggling to keep pace and his fourth pint was making him slur a little. Harvey had strict standards about alcohol consumption—don’t get silly until the fifth pint—but he politely ignored Josh’s faux pas.
“I’ve thrown the letter away,” he said, making sure he enunciated clearly. “I just don’t see the point really. What could I possibly say or do to interest those people?”
The letter had arrived in the Saturday post and Harvey had been expecting it. It offended everything in his nature that he was expecting it, indeed he had tried very hard not to expect it, which is a difficult trick to perform. Every year they came, and every year he attempted it. And every year the trick failed. When it arrived he had a debate with himself and this too was a repeat of one he’d been having for twenty years. The debate involved two levels. The first was the “I’m not going to go” level. The second was the “I’m not going to let my going or not going mean anything in a feeble, shallow way about where my life has got to” level. The letter was an invitation to a reunion at his old school in Cornwall, and at both levels he usually lost.
This year was particularly pressing as it was twenty years and would be a more formal affair. Twenty years since they had sat their O levels together in the drafty school hall, the same place they would hold the reunion. And now O levels were a historical relic, as meaningless when trying to impress the younger generation as boasting of your high score on Space Invaders.
“So tell them you run a comic shop.” Josh managed to make it sound like a good thing to say.
“Mmm, you mean tell them exactly what I told them the last time I was down two years ago, and the year before that and five years ago, and ten?”
“Well, yeah.”
Harvey sighed his sigh, and flicked cigarette ash into a metal tin on the ugly little table that the pub grudgingly allowed its customers to sit at. “Admit that in the years since I last saw them I’ve not got married, or had any children, or had a promotion, or inherited a fortune . . . That what I’ve done is exactly the same thing I was doing last time I went?”
“Well, tell them you’ve expanded.”
“They’ll see that for themselves.”
“In the shop. Tell them you’re doing really well and planning to open another branch, something like that.”
“Lie to them?”
“Yeah.”
“It’s a thought.” Harvey dropped the stub of his cigarette into the tin tray and watched it lying there smoking by itself. “But if I’m going to do that why not tell them I’ve won the lottery and am moving to New York to open a coffeehouse with superheroes on the walls? I mean, if I’m going to lie why not make it something exciting?”
Josh grinned to announce a joke: “Tell them you found a Superman One.”
Harvey closed his eyes for a long moment. Then he sighed. The fact that he did it a lot didn’t mean it was only a habit.
« A propos de ce titre » peut appartenir à une autre édition de cet ouvrage.
St Vincent de Paul of Lane County
Eugene, OR, Etats-Unis
Vendeur AbeBooks depuis 11 mars 2014
Frais d'expédition à l'intérieur de ce pays : Etats-Unis
| Article | 4 à 14 jours ouvrés | 1 à 5 jours ouvrés |
|---|---|---|
| Premier article | EUR 3,51 | EUR 8,79 |
Modes de paiement
Description de la boutique
St Vinnie's Charitable Books is the online book storefront for St Vincent de Paul Society of Lane County Oregon. We are a charitable organization that serves over 84,000 people annually through homeless shelters, affordable housing and emergency services. We are passionate about books and sell over 1 million books annually throughout though our retail operations.
Spécialité
Textbooks, Antiques and Collectibles, Mathematics, Business & Economics, History, Fiction, Religion, First Edition Books, Biographies & Autobiographies, ReferenceProfil professionnel du vendeur
St Vincent de Paul of Lane County
2890 Chad Drive
Eugene, OR Etats-Unis 97408
Conditions de vente
We guarantee the condition of every book as it's described
on the Abebooks web sites. If you're dissatisfied with your
purchase (Incorrect Book/Not as Described/Damaged) or if the
order hasn't arrived, you're eligible for a refund within 30
days of the estimated delivery date. If you've changed your
mind about a book that you've ordered, please use the Ask
bookseller a question link to contact us and we'll respond
within 2 business days.
Droit de rétractation
Si vous êtes un consommateur, vous pouvez exercer votre droit de rétractation sur le contrat conformément à ce qui suit. Le mot « consommateur » désigne toute personne physique agissant à des fins qui n'entrent pas dans le cadre de son activité commerciale, artisanale ou professionnelle.
Informations concernant le droit de rétractation
Droit statutaire de rétractation
Vous avez le droit d'exercer votre droit de rétractation sur ce contrat dans les 14 jours sans donner de raison.
Le délai de rétractation expirera au bout de 14 jours à compter du jour où vous-même, ou un tiers autre que le transporteur et désigné par vous, prendrez physiquement possession de la dernière marchandise, du dernier lot ou de la dernière pièce.
Pour exercer votre droit de rétractation, remplissez électroniquement et envoyez une déclaration claire sur notre site Web, sous « Vos achats » dans « Votre compte ». Nous vous communiquerons sans délai un accusé de réception de cette rétractation sur un support durable (par exemple, par e-mail).
Pour respecter le délai de rétractation, il vous suffit d'envoyer votre message concernant l'exercice de votre droit de rétractation avant l'expiration du délai de rétractation.
Effets de la rétractation
Si vous exercez votre droit de rétractation sur ce contrat, nous vous rembourserons tous les paiements que vous avez effectués, y compris les frais de livraison (à l'exception des frais supplémentaires résultant du choix d'un mode de livraison autre que le type de livraison standard le moins cher que nous proposons).
Nous pouvons déduire du remboursement la perte de valeur de toute marchandise livrée, si la perte est le résultat d'une manipulation inutile de votre part.
Nous effectuerons le remboursement dans les meilleurs délais, et au plus tard 14 jours après le jour où nous aurons été informés de votre décision d'exercer votre droit de rétractation sur ce contrat.
Nous effectuerons le remboursement en utilisant le même moyen de paiement que celui que vous avez utilisé pour la transaction initiale, sauf si vous en avez expressément convenu autrement ; en tout état de cause, aucuns frais ne vous seront facturés à la suite d'un tel remboursement.
Nous pouvons suspendre le remboursement jusqu'à ce que nous ayons reçu les marchandises ou que vous ayez fourni la preuve que vous avez renvoyé les marchandises, en fonction de la première éventualité.
Vous devez renvoyer les marchandises ou les remettre à St Vincent de Paul of Lane County, Eugene, Oregon, U.S.A., sans retard injustifié et, en tout état de cause, au plus tard 14 jours à compter du jour où vous nous avez communiqué votre décision de rétractation du présent contrat. Le délai est respecté si vous renvoyez les marchandises avant l'expiration du délai de 14 jours. Vous devrez prendre en charge les frais directs du renvoi des marchandises. Vous n'êtes responsable que de toute diminution de valeur des marchandises résultant d'une manipulation autre que celle nécessaire pour établir la nature, les caractéristiques et le fonctionnement des marchandises.
Exceptions au droit de rétractation
Le droit de rétractation ne s'applique pas à ce qui suit :
- Distribution de journaux, de revues ou de magazines, à l'exception des contrats d'abonnement ; et
- Fourniture d'un contenu numérique qui n'est pas fourni sur un support matériel (par exemple, sur un CD ou un DVD) si vous avez accepté, lors de votre commande, que nous puissions commencer à le livrer et que vous ne puissiez pas exercer votre droit de rétractation une fois la livraison commencée.
Conditions d'expédition
Orders usually ship within 1 business day. Shipping costs are based on books weighing 2.2 LB, or 1 KG. If your book order is heavy or oversized, we may contact you to let you know extra shipping is required.