The Astral is a huge rose-colored old pile of an apartΒment building in the gentrifying neighborhood of Greenpoint, Brooklyn. For decades it was the happy home (or so he thought) of the poet Harry Quirk and his wife, Luz, a nurse, and of their two children: Karina, now a ferΒvent freegan, and Hector, now in the clutches of a cultish Christian community. But Luz has found (and destroyed) some poems of Harryβs that ignite her long-simmering susΒpicions of infidelity, and heβs been summarily kicked out. He now has to reckon with the consequence of his literary, marital, financial, and parental failures (and perhaps othΒers) and find his way forwardβand back into Luzβs good graces.
Harry Quirk is, in short, a loser, living small and low in the water. But touched by Kate Christensenβs novelistic grace and acute perception, his floundering attempts to reach higher ground and forge a new life for himself become funny, bittersweet, and terrifically moving. She knows what secrets lurk in the hearts of menβand she turns them into literary art of the highest order.
Media Buzz
All Things Considered - June 23, 2011 All Things Considered - June 7, 2011
© 2003-2026