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Staff Pick
Nick Hornby does an excellent job of deconstructing relationships using smart, funny dialogue and characters, and State of the Union is no exception. Louise and Tom are trying to repair their marriage in couple’s therapy, but the real gist of the matter unfolds in the time spent before their sessions, as they grapple with the many foibles that intimacy brings. Recommended By Lucinda G., Powells.com
Synopses & Reviews
A heartbreaking, funny, and honest look inside of a marriage falling apart and the lengths a couple would go to in order to fix it from the bestselling author of About a Boy and High Fidelity.
"Hornby is a writer who dares to be witty, intelligent, and emotionally generous all at once." The New York Times Book Review
Tom and Louise meet in a pub before their couple's therapy appointment. Married for years, they thought they had a stable home life — until a recent incident pushed them to the brink.
Going to therapy seemed like the perfect solution. But over drinks before their appointment, they begin to wonder: what if marriage is like a computer? What if you take it apart to see what's in there, but then you're left with a million pieces?
Unfolding in the minutes before their weekly therapy sessions, the ten-chapter conversation that ensues is witty and moving, forcing them to look at their marriage — and, for the first time in a long time, at each other.
Review
"Witty and intimate." WNYC
Review
"Consisting almost entirely of witty repartee." Kirkus Reviews
Review
"True story: One of our editors read Nick Hornby’s entire novella-esque exploration of marriage while getting a pedicure. Which is to say, it’s quick, sharp, and absorbing, and it fits in a small handbag." goop
About the Author
Nick Hornby is the author of the bestselling novels Juliet, Naked; Slam; A Long Way Down; How to Be Good; High Fidelity; and About a Boy, and the memoir Fever Pitch. He is also the author of Songbook, a finalist for a National Book Critics Circle Award, Shakespeare Wrote for Money, and The Polysyllabic Spree, and editor of the short story collection Speaking with the Angel. A recipient of the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ E.M. Forester Award and Oscar-nominated for his screenplay, An Education, Hornby lives in North London.