L.i.e.

Long Island, New York, 1988: Harlan Kessler -- born and bred in North Bellport, in blue-collar Suffolk County, through which runs the Long Island Expressway (the L.I E.), connecting the outlying suburbs to the east with the tonier climes of Nassau country and New York City to the west -- graduates from high school. He plays in a band, he parties, he works diligently to lose his virginity. He doesn't think about the future much, except as an escape from the present. He sometimes thinks that none of this, his life, is really happening, that he might be a character in someone else's script, a thought in someone else's mind.L.I.E. follows Harlan, his family, and friends through two years of love, sex, death, betrayal, salvation, and enlightenment. In ten discrete but intimately interwoven stories, in prose that swings fluidly from gritty realism to heightened metafiction, writer David Hollander maps an American landscape that is at once vividly familiar and highly exotic, creating a classic portrait of the passage to adulthood, and the search for identity, certain to resonate with legions of readers. Already inviting comparison to the work of some of the most innovative writers around, L.I E. is the striking debut of a terrific talent.

Review :
" An entertaining coming-of-age story set in one of America's legendary weird suburbs . . . Hollander is an inventive writer who manages simultaneously to romanticize and to parody his own experience." "- The Washington Post " " The landscape of Long Island is a critical presence in the book, and Hollander portrays it with as much vitality and detail as the human characters. . . . One of the best aspects of "L.I.E." is that is can be read on several different levels. Sufficiently lighthearted and amusing for casual readers, it contains enough emotional complexity and even tragedy to suit those who long for deeper reading. Those who seek challenge and profundity will find plenty of food for thought in Harlan's existential dilemma. . . . This unconventional novel [is] a rewarding and entertaining experience." "- The Wellesley News " " Hollander displays a keen eye for the ordinary, capturing teenage discontent and suburban malaise without pretense." - "Gear" "From the Trade Paperback edition." "An entertaining coming-of-age story set in one of America's legendary weird suburbs . . . Hollander is an inventive writer who manages simultaneously to romanticize and to parody his own experience." "-The Washington Post "The landscape of Long Island is a critical presence in the book, and Hollander portrays it with as much vitality and detail as the human characters. . . . One of the best aspects of "L.I.E. is that is can be read on several different levels. Sufficiently lighthearted and amusing for casual readers, it contains enough emotional complexity and even tragedy to suit those who long for deeper reading. Those who seek challenge and profundity will find plenty of food for thought in Harlan's existential dilemma. . . . This unconventional novel [is] a rewarding and entertaining experience." "-The Wellesley News "Hollander displays a keen eye for the ordinary, capturing teenage discontent and suburban malaise without pretense." -"Gear "From the Trade Paperback edition.