Andrew Palmer presents The Bachelor: A Novel

Third Place Books welcomes local author Andrew Palmer to our Seward Park store for the paperback launch of his witty and provocative novel The Bachelor. Author Events Manager Spencer writes, "That is our 'pointed task. Love & die." So says John Berryman, the pre-eminent lovedrunk poet and the central obsession of Andrew Palmer's debut novel, The Bachelor, a book that is, yes, partially about romantic love in the age of reality television. But what if you're not a fame-starved Instagram model, and instead a brooding but friendly millennial type, recently void of artistic ambition? Palmer's brilliant work is full of insight and romantic mistakes, like reading the best of Andrew Martin, Ben Lerner, or Elif Batuman. Palmer extracts the language of love for what it is—its hollowness! its empty repetition! ("I've never felt this way before." "I think I'm falling for you.") It's a difficult thing to watch, as it starts to indict us all."

This event is free and open to the public. Registration is required in advance.

Copies of The Bachelor will be available for purchase at the store. This event will include a public signing and time for audience Q&A. Sustain our author series by purchasing a copy of the featured book!

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This event is free to attend. Registration is required in advance.

Reeling from a breakup with his almost-fiancée, the narrator of Andrew Palmer's first novel returns to his hometown in Iowa to house-sit for a family friend. There, a chance flick of the TV remote and a new correspondence with an old friend plunge him into unlikely twin obsessions: the reality TV show The Bachelor and the Pulitzer Prize-winning poet John Berryman. As his heart begins to mend, his fascination with each deepens. Somewhere along the way, representations of reality become harder and harder to distinguish from real life. Soon he finds himself corresponding with multiple love interests, participating in an ill-considered group outing, and trying to puzzle through the strange turn his life seems to have taken.

Smart, sexy, and provocative, The Bachelor is also an absorbing coming-of-age tale that tells the story of finding one's footing in love and art. If salvation can no longer be found in fame, can it still be found in romantic relationships? In an era in which reality TV can make two dozen women fall in love with one man in six weeks, where does entertainment end and reality begin? Why do we, season after season, repeat the same mistakes in love and life?

Andew Palmer is a writer whose work has appeared in The Times Literary Supplement and McSweeney's and online at Slate, The Paris Review, and The New Yorker. He has been a fiction fellow at the Fine Arts Work Cetner in Provincetwon, Massachusets, and a resident at Ucross, the Anderson Center, and Yaddo. He grew up in Iowa and lives in Seattle with his partner and their dog. The Bachelor is his first novel. (Photo credit: Liza Birnbaum)

Founded in 1998 in Lake Forest Park, Washington, Third Place Books is dedicated to the creation of a community around books and the ideas inside them. With locations in Lake Forest Park and Seattle's Ravenna and Seward Park neighborhoods, Third Place Books is proud to serve the entire Seattle metro area. Learn more about their event series at thirdplacebooks.com/events.

Event Venue & Nearby Stays

Third Place Books, 5041 Wilson Ave S, Seattle, United States