An Available Man
by Hilma Wolitzer
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Pub Date Jan 24 2012 | Archive Date Sep 01 2012
Random House Publishing Group | Ballantine
Description
In this tender and funny novel,
award-winning author Hilma Wolitzer mines the unpredictable fallout of suddenly
becoming single later in life, and the chaos and joys of falling in love the
second time around. When Edward Schuyler, a modest and bookish
sixty-two-year-old science teacher, is widowed, he finds himself ambushed by
female attention. There are plenty of unattached women around, but a healthy,
handsome, available man is a rare and desirable creature. Edward receives phone
calls from widows seeking love, or at least lunch, while well-meaning friends
try to set him up at dinner parties. Even an attractive married neighbor offers
herself to him.
The problem is that Edward doesn't feel available. He's still mourning
his beloved wife, Bee, and prefers solitude and the familiar routine of work,
gardening, and bird-watching. But then his stepchildren surprise him by placing
a personal ad in The New York Review of Books on his behalf. Soon the
letters flood in, and Edward is torn between his loyalty to Bee's memory and
his growing longing for connection. Gradually, reluctantly, he begins dating
("dating after death," as one correspondent puts it), and his encounters are
variously startling, comical, and sad. Just when Edward thinks he has the game
figured out, a chance meeting proves that love always arrives when it's least
expected.
With wit, warmth, and a keen understanding of the heart, An Available Man
explores aspects of loneliness and togetherness, and the difference in the
options open to men and women of a certain age. Most of all, the novel
celebrates the endurance of love, and its thrilling capacity to bloom anew.
Hilma Wolitzer is the author of several novels, including Summer Reading, The Doctor's Daughter, Hearts, Ending, and Tunnel of Love, as well as a nonfiction book, The Company of Writers. She is a recipient of Guggenheim and NEA fellowships, an Award in Literature from the American Academy of Arts and Letters, and the Barnes & Noble Writer for Writers Award. She has taught writing at the University of Iowa, New York University, and Columbia University.
Advance Praise
Advance praise for An Available Man
"Heartbreaking, maddening, comical, and poignant...This sweet story of a man's diving back into the dating pool at an older age will especially appeal to readers in that demographic. "--Library Journal
"I absolutely loved An Available Man (and not, I swear, because I'm
partial to widowers). For a start, Edward Schuyler is someone I desperately
wish I could invite to my next dinner party (and not, I swear, because there
are half a dozen women I'd like him to meet). This is a book to savor page by
page, filled with astute detail, both comic and mournful, about what it's like
to be middle-aged and lonely yet not give up on the search for love."-Julia
Glass, author of The Widower's Tale and the National Book Award-winning Three
Junes
"Wolitzer [writes] of the pain of losing a partner and its aftermath . . . with
remarkable insight, grace, and humor. A warm, keenly incisive view of life's
vicissitudes by a writer too seldom heard from."-Booklist
"Comic, tender, and delicious, in An Available Man, the
broken-hearted rise again to heal and find love anew. Hilma Wolitzer is a
national treasure, and she's at her best here in the story of Edward Schuyler,
a grieving widower who must put down his binoculars to see the world with new
eyes. You will love it!"-Adriana Trigiani, bestselling author of Big
Stone Gap and Very Valentine
"Wolitzer's rapturously charming look at love in late life plumbs the depths of
grief and longing to reveal the heady shine of new possibilities. What can I
say? With its cast of exuberantly alive characters and a wise and witty plot,
this book is love at first sight."-Caroline Leavitt, New York Times
bestselling author of Pictures of You
"Hilma Wolitzer is a master of the domestic world, and her writing is graceful,
stylish, intelligent and so, so funny! This is a lovely novel, an elegant
bouquet of family life, made up of tenderness and confusion, grief and solace,
uncertainty and commitment, and the unexpectedness of love."-Roxana
Robinson, author of Cost
"I'm completely in love with this particular available man, and with the words
that brought him to life for me. This book is very dear to my heart. What a
gratifying read: wit! poignancy! authenticity! I asked myself constantly, How
does Hilma Wolitzer do it?"-Elinor Lipman, author of Then She Found Me
"Families are Wolitzer's turf, and she's an observant and often humorous chronicler of domesticity and the stuff that comes with it: illness, loss, boredom, crankiness, and, on good days, love."-Publishers Weekly
Available Editions
| EDITION | Hardcover |
| ISBN | 9780345527547 |
| PRICE | $25.00 (USD) |
| PAGES | 304 |
