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A novel of startling intimacy, violence, and mercy among friends in a Midwestern university town, from an electric new voice.
Riverhead Books
February 2020
On Sale: February 18, 2020
336 pages
ISBN: 0525538887
EAN: 9780525538882
Kindle: B07SGMRMG3
Hardcover / e-Book
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Literature and Fiction | LGBTQ
A novel of rare emotional power that excavates the social intricacies of a late-summer weekend--and a lifetime of buried pain. Almost everything about Wallace, an introverted African-American transplant from Alabama, is at odds with the lakeside Midwestern university town where he is working toward a biochem degree. For reasons of self-preservation, Wallace has enforced a wary distance even within his own circle of friends--some dating each other, some dating women, some feigning straightness. But a series of confrontations with colleagues, and an unexpected encounter with a young straight man, conspire to fracture his defenses, while revealing hidden currents of resentment and desire that threaten the equilibrium of their community.
Real Life is a gut punch of a novel, a story that asks if it's ever really possible to overcome our private wounds and buried histories--and at what cost.
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