The NeverMind of Brian Hildebrand

Is there life after death? Or more to the point: Is there life after life? Because, sometimes, not dying is worse than death itself. 

Brian Hildebrand is in a coma. Severely brain damaged in the unlikely and self-inflicted accidental event of being run over by his own car, he is diagnosed as being in a permanent vegetative state; a “no hope” case kept on life support only at the stubborn insistence of his mother. Sounds grim, doesn’t it?

But wait. This is a comic novel, and Brian is not the vegetable he is deemed to be. In fact, he is the narrator and protagonist of this possibly impossible tale.

Unbeknownst to his caregivers, Brian is fully conscious, fully cognitive, fully aware, and, inexplicably, smarter than ever. A prisoner in his own frenetic brain, he has morphed into a polymath and multi-dimensional thinker, and is, somehow, able to tell his off-the-wall story as it veers tale-twistingly and mind-bendingly from the haunting to the hilarious, abetted by a far-out cast of characters, possibly of his own creation, possibly not. 

In his head, he consorts with angels, consults with ghosts, and dances with demons, with the clamor and chaos of many worlds simultaneously spinning about in his battered but upgraded brain. How Brian can accomplish all this is the overriding riddle of his saga that is resolved, perhaps, magically. 

Or maybe it’s all in his mind. His muddled but magical mind.

Martin Myers is the author of the novels The Assignment, Frigate, Izzy Manheim's Reunion, and The Secret Viking. With comparisons to some of this past centuries' greatest humourists including Mel Brooks, Woody Allen, and Monty Python, Myers richly inventive writing is sure to make any reader laugh out loud followed by a quizzical moment where they question their own morals, ethics, and reality. His writing has been glowingly reviewed throughout North America and Britain by publications such as The New York Times, Publishers Weekly, Toronto Star, and The Times.

Martin preaches the idea that writing is something everyone should do. It has many benefits--it's a useful organizational device, an aid to memory, a record keeper, and a way of looking at your innermost thoughts from outside yourself. And on top of all that, it's great fun.