{"product_id":"palaver-9780374609078","title":"Palaver","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cb\u003eLong-listed for the National Book Award for Fiction\u003c\/b\u003e \u003c\/p\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\u003cb\u003eNamed a Most Anticipated Book by \u003ci\u003eNew York\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eTime\u003c\/i\u003e, the \u003ci\u003eBoston Globe\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eRolling Stone\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eTIME\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eBustle, \u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eTown \u0026amp; Country\u003c\/i\u003e\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003e\u003cbr\u003eA life-affirming novel of family, mending, and how we learn to love, from the award-winning Bryan Washington. \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eIn Tokyo, the son works as an English tutor and drinks his nights away with friends at a gay bar. He's entangled in a sexual relationship with a married man, and while he has built a chosen family in Japan, he is estranged from his mother in Houston, whose preference for the son's oft-troubled homophobic brother, Chris, pushed him to leave home. Then, in the weeks leading up to Christmas, ten years since they last saw each other, the mother arrives uninvited on his doorstep. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eWith only the son's cat, Taro, to mediate, the two of them bristle at each other immediately. The mother, wrestling with memories of her youth in Jamaica and her own complicated brother, works to reconcile her good intentions with her missteps. The son struggles to forgive. But as life steers them in unexpected directions--the mother to a tentative friendship with a local bistro owner and the son to a cautious acquaintance with a new patron of the bar--they begin to see each other more clearly. During meals and conversations and an eventful trip to Nara, mother and son try as best they can to determine where \"home\" really is--and whether they can even find it in one another. \u003cp\u003e\u003c\/p\u003eWritten with understated humor and an open heart, moving through past and present and across Houston, Jamaica, and Japan, Bryan Washington's \u003ci\u003ePalaver \u003c\/i\u003eis an intricate story of family, love, and the beauty of a life among others.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAbout the Author\u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eBryan Washington \u003c\/b\u003eis the author of the story collection \u003ci\u003eLot \u003c\/i\u003eand the novels \u003ci\u003eMemorial \u003c\/i\u003eand \u003ci\u003eFamily Meal\u003c\/i\u003e. A National Book Foundation 5 Under 35 Honoree, he is the winner of the Dylan Thomas Prize, the NYPL Young Lions Fiction Award, two Lambda Literary Awards, and a PEN\/O. Henry Prize, and he has been a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award for Fiction, the Aspen Words Literary Prize, the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize, the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction, and the James Tait Black Prize. A frequent contributor to \u003ci\u003eThe New Yorker\u003c\/i\u003e and\u003ci\u003e The New York Times\u003c\/i\u003e food section, his writing has also appeared in \u003ci\u003eThe New York Times Magazine\u003c\/i\u003e, \u003ci\u003eTime\u003c\/i\u003e, and \u003ci\u003eThe Paris Review Daily\u003c\/i\u003e. Raised in Texas, he lives in Houston and Japan.\u003cbr\u003e","brand":"Farrar, Straus and Giroux","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51690853957906,"sku":"9780374609078","price":20.99,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0831\/4771\/8930\/files\/img_954f5c49-a712-4bd2-8968-f985b139ad4b.jpg?v=1761749895","url":"https:\/\/surprise-castle.myshopify.com\/products\/palaver-9780374609078","provider":"Surprise Castle","version":"1.0","type":"link"}