All the Sad Young Literary Men

Description

A brilliant novel of manners following three twentysomething men struggle with the tribulations of work, sex, relationships - and literary fame. A charming yet scathing portrait of young adulthood at the opening of the twenty-first century, All the Sad Young Literary Men charts the lives of Sam, Mark, and Keith, as they overthink their college years, underthink their love lives, and struggle through the encouragement of the women who love and despise them to find a semblance of maturity, responsibility, and even literary fame. At every turn, at each character's misstep, this assured debut radiates with comedic warmth and biting honesty and signals the arrival of a brave and trenchant new writer.

Keith Gessen was born in Russia and raised in Massachusetts. A contributor to The New Yorker, The New York Times Book Review, and New York magazine, he is also a founding editor of the literary magazine n+1. He is the translator of the National Book Critics Circle Award-winning Voices from Chernobyl, the forthcoming Penguin Classics edition of Ludmila Petruskevskaya's Scary Fairy Tales, and he wrote the introduction to the Penguin Classics edition of Mikhail Bulgakov's A Dead Man's Memoir. Gessen lives in Brooklyn, New York.

Intriguing and well-crafted...approaches greatness...his prose is cleanly wrought and carefully composed, smooth, funny and poignant * Literary Review * A dazzling novel * Guardian * Cruelty and affection and erudition and innocence are so perfectly balanced in these stories, they almost make me wish I were young again -- Jonathan Franzen Marks a welcome entry into the American novel * Independent * Smart, funny and compassionate: a near-perfect debut -- Lesley MacDowell * The Herald *