David Trent is an aspiring novelist in Cambridge, Massachusetts, trying to navigate his ambitions in a place that has writers around every corner. He lives in an apartment above a Very Famous Author named Silas Hale who, beneath his celebrated image, is a bombastic, vindictive monster who refuses to allow his new neighbor even to make eye contact with him—until young David wins a prestigious award for his new book. Suddenly Silas is interested—if intensely spiteful. But soon, the administrator of the award comes to David with alarming news, forcing the writer into a desperate set of choices.
Cleverly plotted .... Pearl’s specific target is the rarified fortress of literary publishing, but the questions he raises extend well beyond its battlements.
Engaging ... This is a book that feels, on the surface, like it’s about the fault in our literary stars but is actually ⎯ to borrow another writer’s famous phrasing ⎯ in ourselves.
Pearl creates a thrilling, introspective, entertaining world where each major character is just as unlikable as the next one. There is a chilling relatability to Pearl’s handful of questionable figures, calling attention to the dangers of ambition in all of us.
