Porter writes in a style that is lucid and unadorned; in outfitting his prose, he skipped the metaphor shop, though he does make an occasional segue into lyricism to capture moments of repose amid the discord ... The Imagined Life would be a downer were it not endowed with sympathy and propelled by the mystery behind the Mills family’s undoing. You want to find out what happens.
[The] nostalgia is artfully crafted by setting ... A deft exploration of male relationships, a mediation on how much we inherit from those who raise us, a study of shame set across the Aids epidemic, but above all, it’s a poignant, achingly beautiful story of human love, and the lengths we’ll go to for those we care for.
The Imagined Life toggles between description—of Steven’s trip up the California coast to question his father’s brother and former colleagues (the least successful part of the novel)—and evocative, fine-grained recollections of Steven’s preadolescent life. Mr. Porter’s conjuring of al fresco backyard faculty parties fairly gleams ... Most poignant, though, are the accounts of Steven’s tentative, unsettling sexual connection with his best friend.
If The Imagined Life’s queer politics is refreshingly non-identitarian...its narrator is bracingly candid about the messiness of his intimate life ... Andrew Porter is well known for his short stories, and his skills are once again on clear display in this debut novel—in its use of telling detail, its affective economy of repetition, its fruitful ambiguity. It is these elements, however, that become strained in the longer form. Yet The Imagined Life is compulsively readable, and it will surely find its way into many Santa Monica, Fire Island and Bondi summer book bags, whose owners can look forward to its vein of attenuated nostalgia and cautious hope.
Master prose stylist Porter expertly evokes the heady atmosphere of Steven’s memories while sharply rendering the costs of the 'imagined life' that Steven has clung to ever since, possibly at the expense of his own. Recommend to fans of Paul Harding’s Tinkers.
