Glass

Meet Günter Glass: ex-milkman and aspiring window-cleaner, struggling to find his way in the modern world.Ever since a childhood visit to a glass-blower's workshop, Günter has had an unusual fixation with glass. When a minor adventure up the spire of Salisbury cathedral turns him into a local celebrity - and gives him a taste for extreme heights - Günter is called to his dream job: cleaning Europe's tallest skyscraper, London's Shard.Enchantingly under-prepared for the bright lights of the city - and philosophically under-equipped for sharing a flat with an eccentric German intellectual called the Steppenwolf - Günter must navigate his own way through life, armed only with his mother's homespun wisdom and knowledge gleaned from haphazard wanderings through Wikipedia. But will his innocence put him on a collision course with the baffling modern world?Glass is a novel about learning to wise up to the world around you. Charming, funny and slyly clever, it establishes Alex Christofi as one of Britain's most exciting new writers.