Woody Brown

Implosive and wonderfully inspirational. Upward Bound is acutely aware that be it indigo, autism, social class, or the gamma ray, everything and everyone is on the spectrum

PAUL BEATTY, Booker Prize winner of The Sellout

Great characters, great pace, great story – reading Upward Bound is a complicated joy

RODDY DOYLE, Booker Prize winner of Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha

Upward Bound gives us the world from the perspective of someone rarely noticed or understood . . . Wondrous and distinctly brilliant

RIVKA GALCHEN, author of Everyone Knows Your Mother is a Witch

Woody Brown accomplishes the seemingly impossible; he gives voice to a character with a sensibility both intelligent, ironic and loveable, who cannot himself speak

MONA SIMPSON, author of Anywhere but Here

Upward Bound is a highly original, captivating, brilliantly observed novel about the power of human relationships and the complexities of communication

CAOILINN HUGHES, author of The Wild Laughter

Woody Brown’s vibrant and profoundly moving debut novel takes us to sun-bleached California, to a daycare centre for Los Angeles’s disabled community. 
 
Among the clients and staff are Carlos, a charismatic aide who lost his mother as a boy, and Jorge, who is gentle, nonspeaking and prone to escape despite Carlos’s best efforts. Tom, a beautiful young man with cerebral palsy, pines for Ann, the lifeguard for the summer who feels out of her depth. Then there’s Dave, the centre’s director. He wanted to be an actor, but finds himself on a very different path. 
 
At the heart of Upward Bound is Walter, a recent college student returning to the company of his peers after a family tragedy. Around him, a story unfolds of friendships forged, connections missed and the dreams – some new, others almost forgotten – that shape us. With his wit, empathy and astonishing gifts as a storyteller, Woody Brown immerses us in life as we have never experienced it before.

Woody Brown

Praise for Upward Bound

Implosive and wonderfully inspirational. Upward Bound is acutely aware that be it indigo, autism, social class, or the gamma ray, everything and everyone is on the spectrum

Great characters, great pace, great story – reading Upward Bound is a complicated joy

Upward Bound gives us the world from the perspective of someone rarely noticed or understood . . . Wondrous and distinctly brilliant

Implosive and wonderfully inspirational. Upward Bound is acutely aware that be it indigo, autism, social class, or the gamma ray, everything and everyone is on the spectrum

Great characters, great pace, great story – reading Upward Bound is a complicated joy

Upward Bound gives us the world from the perspective of someone rarely noticed or understood . . . Wondrous and distinctly brilliant

Implosive and wonderfully inspirational. Upward Bound is acutely aware that be it indigo, autism, social class, or the gamma ray, everything and everyone is on the spectrum

Great characters, great pace, great story – reading Upward Bound is a complicated joy

Upward Bound gives us the world from the perspective of someone rarely noticed or understood . . . Wondrous and distinctly brilliant

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