Great Reads for Great Readers

 

Less is Lost, by Andrew Sean Greer.

 

            It is an infinite pleasure to welcome back Arthur Less, hapless hero of ‘Less’, Andrew Sean Greer’s 2018 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel.  He hasn’t changed much;  he’s still a minor American novelist;  he’s still shy and blushes easily, confidence a fleeting visitor in his life and work, but!  He is still with his great love, Freddie Palu, living in the tiny house of his famous poet ex-lover (recently deceased) in San Francisco – but.

            For a number of obscure reasons, Arthur is unsure of Freddie’s devotion, especially as Freddie, a high school teacher, has removed himself to Maine on a three-month sabbatical, taking a university course in narrative form.  Arthur plans to join Freddie as soon as possible, and make a start on his next novel.  It’s no fun living alone in their hilly little eyrie, and having to attend the ex’s last rites with the ex’s widow Marian who, after years of hating him for stealing her husband, now relies on him to be her emotional and physical support at the great man’s funeral.  Life is full of ironies, big and small.  And bombshells delivered by Marian, in the shape of monies owed by Less for the aforesaid Eyrie – for which he has paid no rent of any kind for at least ten years – and a time limit of one month in which he has to find the money ‘so that the will can be probated, then the Eyrie will be his’.  When the news is relayed to Freddie, he is aghast:  how can someone never think to question whether he owes rent?  ‘The subject never came up,’ says Arthur uncomfortably.  Even he sees that this is taking trust too far.

Strong action must be taken:  no trip to Maine to see outraged Freddie – he must go on the Southern speaking tour and the PrizeGiving Committee that his agent has commanded he attend, and oversee in Savannah the turning into a musical (!) of one of his short stories about his boyhood:  if he slogs his way through this Southern Odyssey, he will have earned enough to clear the debt.

And here Mr Greer has a wonderful time – and so do we! -  with Arthur’s adventures in his borrowed van which, the farther South he travels, seem to call for ever more U.S. flags and bumper stickers (he even wears a cap and grows – not very well – a beard), but never seems able to disguise his gayness, for he is always asked ‘are you Dutch?’  But faint heart never won Fair Freddie, and Less, fired by love, has the stoutest heart of all.  His quest is laugh-out-loud funny, and Greer’s wonderful facility with language is a perpetual pleasure, for Less will always be more than the sum of his parts.  FIVE STARS.