FICTION

All That Man Is

by David Szalay
Graywolf. Oct. 2016. 384p. ISBN 9781555977535. $25; ebk. ISBN 9781555979485. F
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This collection of interconnected short stories all feature men and are linked together by a theme, aging. It begins with two teenage boys backpacking across Europe before heading to university and ends with a reluctantly introspective 73-year-old man recuperating from a car accident in Italy. Each piece focuses on a different man in a particular stage of life. They are single, married, and divorced; students, slackers, strivers, career-focused professionals, the reluctantly unemployed, and retired. Szalay (Spring; The Innocent) does an excellent job of creating distinct and fleshed-out male protagonists and evoking various European cities in an easy and engaging style even when addressing difficult subjects.
VERDICT Warning: this collection privileges believability over likability, so those who want lovable characters may be disappointed. This would be a good choice for book clubs as readers won't find well-developed female characters and can discuss the lack of female representation.
Reviewed by Pamela Mann, St. Mary's Coll. Lib., MD , Oct 15, 2016
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