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Get Me Out of Here
Set in London in autumn 2008, Matt Freeman is tired of the hollow corporate life and empty consumerism around him and desperately searches for a means of escape. Get Me Out of Here is a novel of comic anger, success and failure – and, fundamentally, belief – in a wornout city.
- GenresFiction
272 pages, Paperback
First published January 21, 2010
2 people are currently reading
91 people want to read
About the author
Henry Sutton
36 books9 followersDavid Rytman Slavitt (born 23 March 1935 in White Plains, New York) is a writer, poet, and translator, the author of more than 100 books.
Slavitt attended Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, where his first writing teacher was Dudley Fitts. He received an undergraduate degree from Yale University (where he studied under Cleanth Brooks and Robert Penn Warren and was elected class poet, "Scholar of the House," in 1956), graduating with a Bachelor of Arts (magna cum laude), and then a Master's degree in English from Columbia University in 1957
Before becoming a full-time free-lance writer in 1965, Slavitt worked at various jobs in the literary field. These included a stint in the personnel office of Reader's Digest in Pleasantville, New York; teaching English at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta (1957–1958); and a variety of jobs at Newsweek in New York. Slavitt began there as a mailroom clerk, was promoted to the positions of book reviewer and film critic, and earned the position of associate editor from 1958 to 1963. He edited the movies pages from 1963 to 1965.
Okla Elliott, a professor and Illinois Distinguished Fellow at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign, has written of Slavitt that he "served as an associate editor at Newsweek until 1965, teaching himself Greek on his 35-minute commute. In his last two years at Newsweek, he had a reputation as an astute, sometime cranky, but always readable 'flicker picker' and gained some notoriety for his film reviews there."
Slavitt taught as an assistant professor at the University of Maryland, College Park, in 1977, and at Temple University, in Philadelphia, as associate professor from 1978 to 1980. Slavitt was a lecturer at Columbia University from 1985 to 1986, at Rutgers University in 1987, and at the University of Pennsylvania in 1991. He has served as a visiting professor at the University of Texas at El Paso and other institutions. He has given poetry readings at colleges and universities, at the Folger Shakespeare Library, and at the Library of Congress.
His first work, a book of poems titled Suits for the Dead, was published in 1961.
In the 1960s, Slavitt was approached by Bernie Geis & Associates to write a big book, a popular book, which he agreed to if he could use a pseudonym. As Henry Sutton, in 1967 he published The Exhibitionist, which sold more than 4 million copies. He followed this with The Voyeur in 1968 and three more novels as Henry Sutton. He has also published popular novels under the names of David Benjamin, Lynn Meyer, and Henry Lazarus.
Slavitt has published numerous works in translation, especially classics, from Greek, Latin, Hebrew, Spanish and French.
Henry S. Taylor, winner of the 1986 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry, has written, "David Slavitt is among the most accomplished living practitioners" of writing, "in both prose and verse; his poems give us a pleasurable, beautiful way of meditating on a bad time. We can't ask much more of literature, and usually we get far less."
Novelist and poet James Dickey wrote, "Slavitt has such an easy, tolerant, believable relationship with the ancient world and its authors that making the change-over from that world to ours is less a leap than an enjoyable stroll. The reader feels a continual sense of gratitude."
Georgia Jones-Davis, a poet and journalist, has said, "Slavitt is brilliant and he writes with grace, passion and humor."
Awards and honors
Edgar Award Nominee for Best First Novel for Paperback Thriller, 1976
Grant from Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, 1985
National Endowment for the Arts Translation Fellowship, 1988
Literature award, American Academy of Arts and Letters, 1989
Rockefeller Foundation artist's residency, 1989. Slavitt used the time period of the retreat (November 3 - December 12, 1989) to work on a translation of the curse poem Ibis by the Latin poet Ovid.
Kevin Kline Award, 2011, for Outstanding New Play or Musical
Slavitt attended Phillips Academy in Andover, Massachusetts, where his first writing teacher was Dudley Fitts. He received an undergraduate degree from Yale University (where he studied under Cleanth Brooks and Robert Penn Warren and was elected class poet, "Scholar of the House," in 1956), graduating with a Bachelor of Arts (magna cum laude), and then a Master's degree in English from Columbia University in 1957
Before becoming a full-time free-lance writer in 1965, Slavitt worked at various jobs in the literary field. These included a stint in the personnel office of Reader's Digest in Pleasantville, New York; teaching English at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta (1957–1958); and a variety of jobs at Newsweek in New York. Slavitt began there as a mailroom clerk, was promoted to the positions of book reviewer and film critic, and earned the position of associate editor from 1958 to 1963. He edited the movies pages from 1963 to 1965.
Okla Elliott, a professor and Illinois Distinguished Fellow at the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign, has written of Slavitt that he "served as an associate editor at Newsweek until 1965, teaching himself Greek on his 35-minute commute. In his last two years at Newsweek, he had a reputation as an astute, sometime cranky, but always readable 'flicker picker' and gained some notoriety for his film reviews there."
Slavitt taught as an assistant professor at the University of Maryland, College Park, in 1977, and at Temple University, in Philadelphia, as associate professor from 1978 to 1980. Slavitt was a lecturer at Columbia University from 1985 to 1986, at Rutgers University in 1987, and at the University of Pennsylvania in 1991. He has served as a visiting professor at the University of Texas at El Paso and other institutions. He has given poetry readings at colleges and universities, at the Folger Shakespeare Library, and at the Library of Congress.
His first work, a book of poems titled Suits for the Dead, was published in 1961.
In the 1960s, Slavitt was approached by Bernie Geis & Associates to write a big book, a popular book, which he agreed to if he could use a pseudonym. As Henry Sutton, in 1967 he published The Exhibitionist, which sold more than 4 million copies. He followed this with The Voyeur in 1968 and three more novels as Henry Sutton. He has also published popular novels under the names of David Benjamin, Lynn Meyer, and Henry Lazarus.
Slavitt has published numerous works in translation, especially classics, from Greek, Latin, Hebrew, Spanish and French.
Henry S. Taylor, winner of the 1986 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry, has written, "David Slavitt is among the most accomplished living practitioners" of writing, "in both prose and verse; his poems give us a pleasurable, beautiful way of meditating on a bad time. We can't ask much more of literature, and usually we get far less."
Novelist and poet James Dickey wrote, "Slavitt has such an easy, tolerant, believable relationship with the ancient world and its authors that making the change-over from that world to ours is less a leap than an enjoyable stroll. The reader feels a continual sense of gratitude."
Georgia Jones-Davis, a poet and journalist, has said, "Slavitt is brilliant and he writes with grace, passion and humor."
Awards and honors
Edgar Award Nominee for Best First Novel for Paperback Thriller, 1976
Grant from Pennsylvania Council on the Arts, 1985
National Endowment for the Arts Translation Fellowship, 1988
Literature award, American Academy of Arts and Letters, 1989
Rockefeller Foundation artist's residency, 1989. Slavitt used the time period of the retreat (November 3 - December 12, 1989) to work on a translation of the curse poem Ibis by the Latin poet Ovid.
Kevin Kline Award, 2011, for Outstanding New Play or Musical
Ratings & Reviews
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Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews
February 28, 2021
Appears to be a London credit crunch version (closer to complete copy) of American Psycho – featuring an obnoxious central character obsessed with brands and with the breakdown of society and function in London, with the inanities of popular culture and customer service but to a psychopathic degree, with a delusional view that he has some form of promotional business and who may or may not be a serial killer (if he isn’t then a remarkable number of women around him appear to be murdered or go missing and if he is then the police seem incapable of following some very obvious clues). A completely terrible and worthless book.
August 29, 2024
Matt Freeman, the main character of the book, is a highly delusional, permanently angry and extremely brand-concious wanna-be entrepreneur and assumably ex-banker (kind of a poor version of Patrick Bateman from American Psycho). I really got to love his constant monologues and complaining to shop clerks, a hilarious book indeed.
February 9, 2023
The writing is the only reason I didn’t rate this one star :/ A lot of the professional reviews on this book call it a comedy but I can’t imagine that a straight white male psychopath having graphic sexual fantasies about strangers and then actually killing women in his life is a funny situation for anyone normal.
November 6, 2019
A really good story which could be seen as the British equivalent of "American Psycho". Place and business names, sub-plots and characters all make it all very believable.
The story of an obsessed, paranoid, womanising psychopath who's whole life begins to fall apart at the start of the recession in 2010 - that just acts like a trigger mechanism, things start to get worse and then most of the women in his life start to mysteriously disappear...
Definitely worth 4.2 stars, maybe more, but then again, am I just being paranoid?!!
The story of an obsessed, paranoid, womanising psychopath who's whole life begins to fall apart at the start of the recession in 2010 - that just acts like a trigger mechanism, things start to get worse and then most of the women in his life start to mysteriously disappear...
Definitely worth 4.2 stars, maybe more, but then again, am I just being paranoid?!!
December 4, 2012
In this ghastly portrait of the current financial crisis, Matt Freeman is an utterly repellent character. He's a delusional self-absorbed sociopath, a liar, a leech, a lecher and a stalker. He's obsessed with fashionable designer labels, fine vintages, other people's weight and body odors. He's using an imaginary marketing deal in North Korea to scam money from friends and family. And he kills people. I kept thinking I would quit reading it, but it was creepily fascinating and fairly short.
December 15, 2013
Interesting read. It was rather hard to make myself finish it, but I really appreciated the experience. Stylistically it was very well done. But, in the end, this idea would have been better suited to a short story. It makes me wonder if the author doesn't appreciate the the power that a short story can hold. The power of this story comes from the shock factor. This wears down as the pages go by. The story could have been significantly enhanced with a degree more subtlety which a short story would have required.
At the bottom, the character was just barely believable (again this could been better in a short story). The story became weaker as it went on and in the end the message was left wanting. The author clearly wanted to make a statement about the arrogance and folly of the financial industry. This is a message I was welcoming. However, the flaws in the storytelling meant that this message was lost. Instead the book read as a tale of the disintegration of one man. The broader meaning was lost because he failed to make the broader connection.
All in all, this was probably the most disappointed I've been by a book in a while. Europa Edition has consistently produced quality books. However, this must go down as one of their misses. I won't be recommending this to anyone except if they wish to see what happens when a writers tries to make a novel out of a short story (and fails).
At the bottom, the character was just barely believable (again this could been better in a short story). The story became weaker as it went on and in the end the message was left wanting. The author clearly wanted to make a statement about the arrogance and folly of the financial industry. This is a message I was welcoming. However, the flaws in the storytelling meant that this message was lost. Instead the book read as a tale of the disintegration of one man. The broader meaning was lost because he failed to make the broader connection.
All in all, this was probably the most disappointed I've been by a book in a while. Europa Edition has consistently produced quality books. However, this must go down as one of their misses. I won't be recommending this to anyone except if they wish to see what happens when a writers tries to make a novel out of a short story (and fails).
October 3, 2011
A british take on American Psycho? A lot more subtle than that.
The first person narrative makes it ambigous as to exactly what is going going on. Matt Freeman is in his thirties and a resident of the barbican. He appears to be at war with the city and expectation of how to live as a yuppie.
We meet him as he is trying to get a new pair of designer glasses, having deliberatly broken the last pair in a bid to get the latest styles.
This sets the scene. We are given an insight into his minds meanderings as the city (restaurants, business partners, lovers, old friends, cabbies, the transport system) all conspire against him.
At times deliciously funny. He has a business plan to expand into North Korea and often his disappointment with the City are tempered with what Kim and Koreans would do.
You have to get through the stream of consciousness noise to work out what is going on and it looks like murder is involved at some point. As Matt himself doesnt really know what is going on, its hard to decipher and the book adds no real answers.
The thing that sticks out about the book is how often Matts musings are correct.
A good book.
The first person narrative makes it ambigous as to exactly what is going going on. Matt Freeman is in his thirties and a resident of the barbican. He appears to be at war with the city and expectation of how to live as a yuppie.
We meet him as he is trying to get a new pair of designer glasses, having deliberatly broken the last pair in a bid to get the latest styles.
This sets the scene. We are given an insight into his minds meanderings as the city (restaurants, business partners, lovers, old friends, cabbies, the transport system) all conspire against him.
At times deliciously funny. He has a business plan to expand into North Korea and often his disappointment with the City are tempered with what Kim and Koreans would do.
You have to get through the stream of consciousness noise to work out what is going on and it looks like murder is involved at some point. As Matt himself doesnt really know what is going on, its hard to decipher and the book adds no real answers.
The thing that sticks out about the book is how often Matts musings are correct.
A good book.
February 7, 2012
I'm almost sorry I read the book but I think if one's been involved in finance as I have the book reads almost as a modern day allegory. I read a number of papers that point to the fact our markets today have a psychopathic nature to themselves. Finance has become perverted and become Matt Freeman. Listen to Robert Schiller or read his books and you'll understand how far finance has missed the mark.
The author himself is as talented as a writer as his protagonist in his book is detestable. Matt Freeman, the lead character I think would make a perfect incarnation of modern day finance which believe Henry Sutton is really alluding too.
It really is a satirical look at the pathology that is our miserable lives in miserable times.
The author himself is as talented as a writer as his protagonist in his book is detestable. Matt Freeman, the lead character I think would make a perfect incarnation of modern day finance which believe Henry Sutton is really alluding too.
It really is a satirical look at the pathology that is our miserable lives in miserable times.
April 29, 2015
I think this book was very well written - it is hard to maintain interest in such an appalling, terrifying main character for so long, but Sutton succeeded. It's also to the book's credit that I felt personally compromised and guilt ridden after I finished - a feeling I imagine is similar to binge watching Dexter or some inane reality show. Weaving the brands in constantly was very effective and I liked the commentary about class and grasping for luxury goods. I guess I was most interested in what this book made me feel as a reader, but maybe I would have been better off mentally if I hadn't read it. I am now reading Girl on the Train and finding tinges of unpleasant voyeurism there as well. It wild be interesting to compare and contrast the two novels.
Want to read
October 9, 2011Read half of it. I enjoy satire but this was absolutely dull. The main character is DULL. The plot is DULL. The descriptions are DULL. Everything about it is boring. There's an "American Psycho" comparison on the back cover. Don't be fooled, this is nothing like American Psycho. It tries to make light of the recession but fails, utterly. It's not funny, or witty, it's just annoying.
Why would we need "An American Psycho for the 21st century" anyway. It came out in 1991. You're better off re-reading American Psycho than picking up this dreck.
Why would we need "An American Psycho for the 21st century" anyway. It came out in 1991. You're better off re-reading American Psycho than picking up this dreck.
November 30, 2011
Various reviews and blurbs suggest this is comic, even funny, but I could not agree less: it seemed to me a very serious and well thought out piece of writing with serious points to make, and which makes them well. Reminiscent of American Psycho, if not quite in the same league, it has a similar phantasmagoric feeling, suggestive rather than explicit, leaving the reader to decide what's really going on. A terrific ending too, killer last sentence. Not everyone's cup of tea, I guess, but I thought this was excellent.
December 14, 2011
This meant to be a dark comedy that came off as more of a cloudy goof. Henry Sutton is a capable-enough writer, but Get Me Out Of Here seemed to me liken a watered-down version of much more potent novels (I can see, regarding content, why the blurbs/comparisons to Amis and Ellis are there, but Mr Sutton is no match for their sinister bravado). I'd give it 2 1/2 stars. Didn't hate it, but was glad it only took me a couple days to read.
Read
July 6, 2011Didn't like - at least it didn't take long to read and only bummed out one afternoon of my vacation. Haven't read American Psycho, and if this is like that, as noted on the back cover, I don't need to, ever.
September 29, 2011
Mildly funny satire of vaccous yuppie consumer culture that doesn't deserve to be compared to American Psycho because it is much better. Unlike BEE, Mr. Sutton manages to avoid soundling like he secretly craves all that yuppie crap.
January 24, 2017
Interesting concept, but mostly boring drivel from the constant stream-of-consciousness pov of an unlikeable delusional psychopath. Good lesson in what not to write. Some witty observations though... and a sharp sarcastic parody of the pathetic brand name culture that we now suffer...
July 9, 2011
bret easton ellis rip-off.
October 24, 2011
worst book i've read in a long time. took me forever to finish it and i had to make myself do it.
January 22, 2012
Did not find amusing, interesting or worth reading. It just rubbed me wrong from the first page. I finished it though.
December 3, 2016
Very funny, creepy, a bit too long.
December 30, 2010
Something of Bret Easton Ellis, but lighter.
Displaying 1 - 20 of 20 reviews