title: Little Hands Clapping
text: # Little Hands Clapping
  
  Little Hands Clapping, is a novel by British author Dan Rhodes, published in 2010 by Canongate. Its title comes from a line in Robert Browning's poem The Pied Piper of Hamelin.
  
  ## Plot introduction
  
  The novel centres around a bizarre German museum dedicated to suicide; Herr Schmidt, its grim grey curator; and the respectable Doctor Ernst Frölicher and his shocking secret.
  
  Various characters appear with short lifestories including the Luciano Pavarotti-obsessed founder of the museum and her Pavarotti-lookalike husband, Hulda the cleaner who believes she is doomed to Hell, and Madalena the suicidal Portuguese student.
  
  ## Reception
  
  * "Totally sick and brilliant, He sucks you into his world. I loved it." Douglas Coupland
  * "Almost every page of Little Hands Clapping has superb quirks or asides which will have the reader laughing. A sublime, brilliant novel", The Scotsman
  * "It should please cynical idealists and idealistic cynics alike." Financial Times
  