About this Event
Join us for a conversation with Tom Drury to celebrate his new book, a brilliant novel that returns readers to the Midwest in a moving portrait of contemporary life in a small rural county. The conversation will be followed by a signing.
PLEASE NOTE: RSVPs are encouraged but not required. Seating is limited and will be first come, first served. Doors open at 5:30 pm.
Can't attend?(please specify that you would like it signed in the comments box at checkout).
"A memorable novel that will make the world a less lonely and more mysterious place."—Yiyun Li, Pulitzer Prize winning author of Things in Nature Merely Grow
The award-winning author of the classic The End of Vandalism returns to the Midwestern county he’s chronicled over four decades for a panoramic tale of fate, found families, and the revolutionary possibilities of love
A lonely highway, a traveler, and a revolver . . . Teenage Rocky and his aunt Helen’s roadside discovery on a winter afternoon sets off a mysterious yet inevitable chain of events that will assemble citizens of Grouse County in a quest for knowledge, romance, and an occasional shared supper with a decent bottle of wine. Characters from Drury’s previous novels—the stoic sheriff, the red-headed photographer, the retired thief—are joined by a vibrant new cast including a trio of teens in a secret club named after a nineteenth-century suffragette, a reverend doctor who counsels her flock to perform good works and dance on houseboats, and an amateur film scholar who inspires a meet-cute in a plasma donation center.
Marked by uncanny dialogue, subversive humor, and indelible descriptions of natural and human beauty, West of Loveland is a warm and polyphonic portrait of a singular community navigating a version of contemporary life with grace and an enduring belief that something good might happen. Drury’s masterwork and the capstone of what is now the Grouse County quartet, West of Loveland offers a revolutionary view of the rural Midwest and a quiet homage to American democracy.
Photo Credit: Amy Bedfer
Tom Drury is the author of five previous novels, including Pacific, long-listed for the National Book Award, and The End of Vandalism, named one of the best books of the past 45 years by GQ Magazine in 2002. His short stories have appeared in The New Yorker, The Paris Review, Harper’s, and A Public Space, and he has received fellowships from the Guggenheim Foundation, the American Academy in Berlin, and MacDowell. He lives in Iowa City.
Nathan Blum’s work has appeared in The New Yorker, The Best American Short Stories, Selected Shorts, Ploughshares, New England Review, Chicago Review of Books, Colorado Review, The Rumpus, and elsewhere. He has received support from the Corporation of Yaddo, Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, the McCormack Writing Center, and Craigardan Arts, as well as nominations for the PEN/Dau Story Prize and the Pushcart Prize. He earned his MFA at Vanderbilt University, where he served as a College of Arts and Sciences Teaching Fellow.
Event venue & nearby stays
Rizzoli Bookstore, 1133 Broadway, New York, United States
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