Don’t Be a Stranger A Novel
Don’t Be a Stranger by Susan Minot is a novel published by Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group on October 15, 2024. This 320-page work explores the complexities of mid-life love through the character of Ivy Cooper, a 52-year-old woman whose life is transformed when she meets Ansel Fleming, a younger musician recently released from prison. The narrative delves into themes of desire, intimacy, and the emotional turmoil that accompanies a passionate affair, presenting a vivid portrayal of Ivy’s dual existence as a devoted mother and a woman consumed by her longing for connection.
Readers will find a rich exploration of family life and psychological dynamics as Ivy navigates her responsibilities while being drawn into a world of erotic obsession. The story captures the tension between her public persona and private desires, highlighting the impact of Ansel’s presence on her life. Through this luminous tale, Minot examines the intricacies of human relationships and the quest for intimacy, making it a thought-provoking addition to contemporary fiction.
Official synopsis Publisher
THE NEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEW EDITORS’ CHOICE • A mesmerizing new novel from the author of Evening: the story of a woman swept into a love affair at mid-life • A luminous story about erotic obsession, the hunger for intimacy, communication, and oblivion that will appeal to readers of Miranda July’s All Fours
“Minot exquisitely explores desire and denial, intimacy and illusion in a ravishing, haunting, and insightful tale of sexual ecstasy and emotional torment, integrity and creativity, self and motherhood.” —Booklist (starred review)
“Minot’s writing is like a diamond knife on ice.” —Elizabeth Strout, Pulitzer Prize winning author
Ivy Cooper is 52 years old when Ansel Fleming first walks into her life. Twenty years her junior, a musician newly released from prison on a minor drug charge, Ansel’s beguiling good looks and quiet intensity instantly seduce her. Despite the gulf between their ages and experience the physical chemistry between them is overpowering, and over the heady weeks and months that follow Ivy finds her life bifurcated by his presence: On the surface she is a responsible mother, managing the demands of friends, an ex-husband, home; but emotionally, psychologically, sexually, she is consumed by desire and increasingly alive only in the stolen moments-out-of-time, with Ansel in her bed.
Don’t Be a Stranger is a gripping, sensual, and provocative work from one of the most remarkable voices in contemporary fiction.
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