My “in a nutshell” summary…

Friends and family living in NYC share their lives one chapter at a time.

My thoughts after reading this book…

New York, private school, divorced parents, gay father, gay friend, sexual identities…this book pretty much has it all. It sort of centers around Wesley…a 15 year old and his friend Theo. Theo sort of announces that he believes he is gay and the novel seems to take its shape from that announcement. This book was also about all of the complicated relationships that involved Wesley. Wesley seems to talk more easily to his dad’s partner, George, but every chapter in this book is yet one more character figuring life out. Each character gets to muddle over things and think about their choices and work on their lives. A traumatic thing happens to Theo and Wesley…you can sort of imagine what that might be..repercussions from Theo’s announcement affect their lives at school. They stick together and deal with it. There are more thoughts and more discussions and the story ends.

What I loved about this book…

I so enjoyed reading about Wesley…he just seemed like a wonderfully questioning young man. The book was funny…the author allowed his sense of humor to come through and I loved it. New York stories are always fun for me and this one was filled with theatre talk and lots of great food gathering. Wesley’s dad’s partner is a true foodie with a love for food prep and the theatre…I loved this aspect of the book.

Final thoughts…

I enjoyed this book and its characters. New York was a fabulous setting. Nothing earth shattering happened and I enjoyed each character…some more than others. People had issues, lives to deal with, stuff to ponder over, stuff to come to terms with. It was an interesting look into a different kind of family.

If you are a reader who loves quirky character driven books…you will truly enjoy this author’s work.

An interesting note about the author…

Richard Kramer is the Emmy and multiple Peabody award winning writer, director and producer of numerous TV series, including Thirtysomething, My So-called Life, Tales of the City, and Once and Again. His first short story appeared in the New Yorker while he was still an undergraduate at Yale. This is his first novel.