The summer friend : a memoir / Charles McGrath.
Material type:
TextPublisher: New York : Alfred A. Knopf, 2022Edition: First editionDescription: 227 pages ; 20 cmContent type: - text
- unmediated
- volume
- 9780593321157
- 0593321154
| Item type | Home library | Collection | Call number | Materials specified | Status | Date due | Barcode | Item holds | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Adult Book
|
Main Library | Biography | MCGRATH, C. M147 | Available | 33111010848824 |
Enhanced descriptions from Syndetics:
Alive with the intoxicating magic of summer in New England, former editor of the New York Times Book Review Charles McGrath's evocative memoir looks back at that sun-soaked season, at family, youth, and a singular bond made at a time when he thought he was beyond making friends.
"Sun-drenched and deeply touching." --The New York Times
"Positively aches with beauty and loss." --Richard Russo, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Empire Falls
It was early evening and a new acquaintance had come to retrieve his daughter from a play date. Instead of driving up in a minivan, he arrived by water, tacking his sailboat smartly across a squiggly channel in the marsh, throwing a rope overboard, and zipping back home, his gleeful daughter riding in the wake. Who knew you could do such a thing? And how could you resist befriending a man such as that?
Over the course of this rich memoir, McGrath recalls with a gimlet eye the pleasures of summers past: amateur lobstering, 9-hole golf, family costume charades, bridge-jumping, and a friendship forged between two men from different backgrounds who came together late in life.
Recounting the vagaries of summer with such precision and warmth-- peeling long strips of sunburnt skin from your shoulder as if "shuffling off your own cocoon," the outdoor shower curtain blowing open in the breeze, an M80 firework in the mailbox--The Summer Friend is simultaneously a potent evocation of the rhythms and rituals of summer and a stirring remembrance of a friend found and then lost.
"This is a Borzoi Book"
"A wistful look back at family, youth, and the intoxicating magic of New England summers, as well as a rumination on friendship and loss, by an esteemed writer and essayist and the former editor of The New York Times Book Review. We all have vivid memories of summers past and the bright skin of youth: of those first days when school has ended; of long days of leisure and pleasure reading dog-eared paperbacks; of camps or cottages or vacation spots we returned to every year; of family road trips and their attendant stresses; of our sexual awakenings and longings; of first dates and becoming lovestruck; of fireworks and lawn games; of penny candies and thunderstorms and drive-in movie theaters; of bracing swims and inevitable sunburns; of outdoor showers and sandy feet; and, who can forget, of timeless friendships forged. In Summer, Charles McGrath looks back at his younger days and the pleasures of summer with affection and longing, recalling with a gimlet eye experiences familiar to so many of us. But he also looks back with a clarity that suggests many of our memories may have become idealized over time. More than a tribute to seasons past, Summer is also a poignant story about friendship, about two men from different backgrounds who come together late in life, bonding over shared experiences, experiences born in the saddle of summer and beyond, and with children afoot. Later, when his friend is stricken with cancer, their relationship is imbued with new measure and meaning"-- Provided by publisher.