The Widower's Tale

Zusatztext 40746124 Informationen zum Autor Julia Glass Klappentext Seventy-year-old Percy Darling is settling happily into retirement: reading novels, watching old movies, and swimming naked in his pond. But his routines are disrupted when he is persuaded to let a locally beloved preschool take over his barn. As Percy sees his rural refuge overrun by children, parents, and teachers, he must reexamine the solitary life he has made in the three decades since the sudden death of his wife. With equal parts affection and humor, Julia Glass spins a captivating tale about a man who can no longer remain aloof from his community, his two grown daughters, or-to his great shock-the precarious joy of falling in love. 1 "Why, thank you. I’m getting in shape to die.” Those were the ?rst words I spoke aloud on the ?nal Thursday in August of last summer: Thursday, I recall for certain, because it was the day on which I read in our weekly town paper about the ?rst of what I would so blithely come to call the Crusades; the end of the month, I can also say for certain, because Elves & Fairies was scheduled, that very evening, to ?ing open its brand-new, gloriously purple doors— formerly the entrance to my beloved barn—and usher in another ?ight of tiny perfect children, along with their preened and privileged parents.   I was on the return stretch of my route du jour, the sun just gaining a vista over the trees, when a youngster who lives half a mile down my street gave me a thumbs-up and drawled, “Use it or lose it, man!” I might have ignored his insolence had he been pruning a hedge or fetch­ing the newspaper, but he appeared merely to be lounging—and smok­ing a cigarette—on his parents’ hyperfastidiously weed-free lawn. He wore tattered trousers a foot too long and the smile of a bartender who wishes to convey that you’ve had one too many libations.   I stopped, jogging in place, and elaborated on my initial remark. “Because you see, lad, ” I informed him, huf?ng rhythmically though still in control, “I have it on commendable authority that dying is hard work, requiring diligence, stamina, and fortitude. Which I intend to maintain in ample supply until the moment of truth arrives.”   And this was no lie: three months before, at my daughter’s Memorial Day cookout, I’d overheard one of her colleagues con?de to another, in solemn Hippocratic tones, “Maternity nurses love to talk about how hard it is to be born, how it’s anything but passive. They explain to all these New Age moms that babies come out exhausted from the work they do, how they literally muscle their way toward the light. Well, if you ask me, dying’s the same. It’s hard work, too. The ?nal stretch is a marathon. I’ve seen patients try to die but fail. Just one more thing they didn’t bother to tell us in med school.” (Creepy, this talk of muscling one’s way toward the dark. Though I did enjoy the concept of all those babies toiling away, lives on the line, like ancient Roman tunnel work­ers, determined to complete their passage.)   As for the youngster with trousers slouched around his bony ankles, my homily had its intended effect. When I ?nished, he hadn’t a syllable at his service; not even the knee-jerk “Whatever” that members of his generation mutter when conversationally cornered. As I went on my way, energized by vindication, I had a dim notion that the youngster’s name was Damien. Or Darius. I put him at ?fteen, the nadir point of youth. Had he been a boy of his age some twenty years ago, I would have known his name without a second thought, not just because I would have known his parents but because in all likelihood he would have mowed my lawn or painted my barn (gratefully!) for an hourly wage appropriate to a teenage boy’s modestly spendthrift habits. Nowa­days, teenage boys with wealthy parents do not mow lawns or paint houses. If they stoop to any sort of pai...

Product details

• Authors: Julia Glass
• Publisher: Anchor Books USA
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback
• Released: 12.07.2011
• EAN: 9780307456106
• ISBN: 978-0-307-45610-6
• No. of pages: 480
• Dimensions: 133 mm x 205 mm x 25 mm
• Subject: Fiction > Narrative literature