Andrew Sean Greers new novelLesshas had a surprisingly long tail.
It may have been released a year ago, butLessisthissummers literary breakout.
Less the man, not the novel is self-conscious and just a bit self-important.
Credit: Back Bay Books
The novel continues to surge; its currently a No.
Its been nonstop, Craig Young, Deputy Publisher of Little, Brown, and Co., tells EW.
The book has found a really wide audience really quickly.
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Its going to be one of the biggest books of the year.
Hes reached middle age as an out and proud gay man with financial security and professional success.
Less is easily bothered and painfully helpless a person without skin.
Less is also alone, a sudden return to his ostensibly gay teenage years.
Hes plateaued after decades of euphoric gay joy.
Think of Arthur Less asQueer as Folks Justin Taylor now balding and jaded.
Life begins while adversity dies.
As Less treks through Europe, his self-pitying slowly gives way to a familiar fear of queer rejection.
Arthur Less is a bad gay.
It speaks to a perpetual fear for queer people: that your community will reject you.
Turning 50, Less finds himself contending with a fatal flaw: old age.
A bad writer, sure Less could handle that.
But a bad gay?
It goes against his core identity.
De-gayed and finally at the big 5-0, hes stuck on a hot camelback caravan in Morocco.
Yes, even if hes gay.
For the first time, Less realizes hes remained soaked in privilege even after checking off the minority box.
Arthur Less is our Brownburn an older gay man from whose story we think, learn, and grow.
Additional reporting by David Canfield
