{"product_id":"down-time-9780374617066","title":"Down Time","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eA terribly funny and lovably louche novel about five friends growing older, if not always up, from Andrew Martin, author of \u003ci\u003eEarly Work\u003c\/i\u003e and \u003ci\u003eCool for America\u003c\/i\u003e. \u003c\/b\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eWithout Cassandra, Aaron would probably be dead. Fortunately, she won't leave him--despite the drinking, flirting, solipsism, armchair socialism, overspending, infidelity, catastrophic depression, and disparate but increasingly frequent spells of drug- and booze-addled debauchery. Unfortunately, she might be reaching the end of her rope. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eCass and Aaron, like the other neurotic, ambivalent intellectuals in their orbit, are getting older. There's Malcolm, with his own alcoholism and marginally more successful writing career; his partner, Violet, a doctor with little patience for both; Antonia, a teaching fellow whose book about ecocide may get her tenure at a prestigious university near Harvard Square--yes, that one. When Sam, a charming trust-fund punk at the center of this loose network, dies suddenly, and a global pandemic takes hold, all five must contend with the lives they've made: their desires and disappointments, habits and hang-ups, pathologies and addictions, and the possibilities of making art and being good as the earth whirls to its end. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003ci\u003eDown Time \u003c\/i\u003emarks the delightful return of Andrew Martin, the author of the pitch-perfect slacker classics \u003ci\u003eEarly Work \u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eCool for America\u003c\/i\u003e. Compulsively readable and contagiously intelligent, this is a wryly comic social novel of settling down, selling out, growing up, and getting out that turns a terribly funny and hyper-literate eye on our most desperately guarded ambitions: to love and be loved, to know and be known, to stay sane, if only just.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAbout the Author\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAndrew Martin\u003c\/b\u003e is the author of the novel \u003ci\u003eEarly Work, \u003c\/i\u003ea \u003ci\u003eNew York Times\u003c\/i\u003e Notable book of 2018, \u003ci\u003e \u003c\/i\u003eand the story collection \u003ci\u003eCool for America, \u003c\/i\u003elonglisted for the 2020 Story Prize. His essays and stories have appeared frequently in \u003ci\u003eThe Paris Review, \u003c\/i\u003e\u003ci\u003eThe New York Review of Books, \u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eHarper's, \u003c\/i\u003eas well as in \u003ci\u003eThe Yale Review\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eThe Atlantic\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eMcSweeney's\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eThe\u003c\/i\u003e \u003ci\u003eTimes Book Review\u003c\/i\u003e and elsewhere. He teaches in Brooklyn and New Hampshire, and lives in New York City with his family.\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Farrar, Straus and Giroux","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":52078147633426,"sku":"9780374617066","price":20.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_b3fb9f07-e9ca-4262-97d3-21a3c2f9fc4e.jpg?v=1772529731","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/down-time-9780374617066","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}