Doc Carson will give a talk and sign copies of his new novel, “Gone Shopping! An Odyssey of Discovery” from 5:30 p.m. to 7 p.m. Thursday at Oread Books in the Kansas Union.

“Gone Shopping!” chronicles a man’s journey through the five-story KT Mall. Based in part on Maslow’s hierarchy of human needs, Carson formulated the idea of the mall as a metaphor for more complex philosophical and psychological concepts he encountered in decades of serious reading. Each level symbolizes one of the essential ingredients for human happiness. The further the narrator ventures, the more difficult items are to obtain. On the fifth and final floor a revelatory conversation focuses on a theory of knowledge that Carson believes to be the foundation of self-fulfillment.

Carson is a native Kansan and resident of Lecompton. He has bachelor’s degrees in philosophy and psychology from Kansas University.