L.I.E: A Novel - Couverture souple

Hollander, David

Couverture souple

ISBN 10 : 0345441001 ISBN 13 : 9780345441003

Editeur : Ballantine Books, 2001

Synopsis

Book by Hollander David

A propos du livre

Extrait

Olympic Material
"And then," Harlan continues, "they put me in the four-by-eight, right
after I'd run the quarter!"

"The four-by-eight?" his father asks.

"Yeah. Four guys, we each run a half-mile. It's a relay."

"Oh."

"Whenever something starts 'four-by,' that means it's a relay."

They're sitting in the den; the television bathes them in a hypnotizing
luminescence. His father is eating what would be Harlan's equivalent of
breakfast. It's five p.m., but Dad works the night shift. He's only been
up an hour.

"So then what happened?"

"Well, I've really been running well lately," Harlan says.

"So they wanted me to anchor."

"Anchor?" His father takes a bite of a scrambled-egg sandwich. He looks
at Harlan briefly, then back at sitcoms.

"Yeah," Harlan says. "That means to go last. The best guy goes last."

"And they wanted you to go last?" With affected pride.

"Yeah. But you know, I was still tired from the other race."

"The quarter."

"Yeah, the quarter."

A breeze blows through the patio door. Beyond the chain-link fence that
marks their territory, cars hurtle. Station Road is a place where kids
drive fast. Harlan will start driving next year, and he imagines he'll
follow local custom.

His father eats quickly, ravenously. He's listening to Harlan; that is,
he wants to listen, but he keeps thinking about the time that Harlan
came up to bat with two outs and runners on first and third in the
bottom half of the last inning of the Little League championships. He
belted a double into the gap in right-center. Was that so long ago? The
team had lifted his son onto their shoulders. They'd paraded his boy
around the diamond. And he'd called Harlan "Mr. Clutch." "That's what
they'll call you from now on, Harlan! Mr. Clutch!" he'd screamed. He'd
felt like a father, like it meant something to be a father.

He swallows up the rest of his sandwich. Harlan goes on.

". . . I wouldn't let him pass me though. Bobby Miller, the best
half-miler in the state! And I held him off!"

"Wow. That's great, Son. That's terrific, Harlan. Maybe you'll be a
track star."

"Well, I don't know about that." He shrugs.

His father carries his plate and coffee cup into the kitchen. The water
runs. Harlan doesn't know why he lied, but he knows that he had to. He
knows it might not even be a lie. In his head it's very clear, it
happened just like he said, he ran anchor, he held off Bobby Miller, it
might have happened that way.

That night his father will unleash the story on a co-worker. "My son's a
track star, you know. Best relay runner in the state, the whole damn
state!"

And years later Harlan will dust it off, in a bar, for a woman who isn't
going home with him. "Sure, we've all got a few things that stick with
us. Like my sub-two half-mile. I was a real speed demon back then,
Olympic material.

Why's that so hard to believe?"

Présentation de l'éditeur

“AT ONCE MORDANTLY FUNNY AND ACHINGLY SAD . . . A SOUL MAP FOR MODERN SUBURBIA.”
–SHERI HOLMAN
Bestselling author of The Dress Lodger

Cutting through the landscape, connecting small towns to the world at large, the Long Island Expressway (the L.I.E.) has many exits–and each one tells a story. It’s the late eighties in Long Island, New York, and eighteen-year-old Harlan Kessler plays in a band, parties with friends, and struggles with a family that offers anything but a Kodak moment. The one ray of hope in Harlan’s life is Sarah DeRosa. With her by his side, Harlan just might make the right choices between love and aggression, intimacy and absence, finding himself and losing his mind. . . .

“[AN] ENGAGING DEBUT . . . If we feel we’ve heard enough about the land at malls and cloverleafs, we’re wrong: it’s probably the most authentically American experience there is, a point that Hollander makes in a blur of concrete, exit signs, and self-deprecating hilarity.”
–Los Angeles Times

“REMARKABLE . . . COMPELLING . . . POWERFUL . . . A young man’s head-on collision with the failed American Dream . . . What makes this book one of note is Hollander’s unique storytelling style. . . . You’ll be richly rewarded by an original, edgy experience.”
–Fort Worth Star-Telegram

Détails de l'édition

• Éditeur: Ballantine Books
• Date d'édition: 2001
• Langue: anglais
• ISBN 10: 0345441001
• ISBN 13: 9780345441003
• Reliure: Broché
• Nombre de pages: 256
• Coordonnées du fabricant: non disponible
• Personne responsable: non disponible