Less (Winner of the Pulitzer Prize) Book Summary

In 'Less,' Arthur Less is a struggling novelist on the brink of turning fifty, who decides to escape the inevitable by embarking on an around-the-world trip filled with eccentric adventures. Chasing after an ex-boyfriend's wedding and navigating through a series of comic mishaps, he hilariously confronts his insecurities and the ticking clock of life. As he travels, Less encounters a vivid tapestry of characters who challenge his perspective and ignite introspection. This Pulitzer Prize-winning novel brilliantly combines humor and heart, offering a profound exploration of love, aging, and the art of letting go. Will Arthur find what he truly seeks, or is the journey itself the destination?

By Andrew Sean Greer

Published: 2018

""You can’t help but wonder if it’s not enough to simply live one life, but you have to try on a few others while you’re at it.""

Book Review of Less (Winner of the Pulitzer Prize)

A struggling novelist travels the world to avoid an awkward wedding in this hilarious Pulitzer Prize-winning novel full of "arresting lyricism and beauty" (New York Times Book Review). WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE National Bestseller A New York Times Notable Book of 2017 A Washington Post Top Ten Book of 2017 A San Francisco Chronicle Top Ten Book of 2017 Longlisted for the Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence, the Lambda Award and the California Book Award "I could not love LESS more."--Ron Charles, Washington Post "Andrew Sean Greer's Less is excellent company. It's no less than bedazzling, bewitching and be-wonderful."--Christopher Buckley, New York Times Book Review Who says you can't run away from your problems? You are a failed novelist about to turn fifty. A wedding invitation arrives in the mail: your boyfriend of the past nine years is engaged to someone else. You can't say yes--it would be too awkward--and you can't say no--it would look like defeat. On your desk are a series of invitations to half-baked literary events around the world. QUESTION: How do you arrange to skip town? ANSWER: You accept them all. What would possibly go wrong? Arthur Less will almost fall in love in Paris, almost fall to his death in Berlin, barely escape to a Moroccan ski chalet from a Saharan sandstorm, accidentally book himself as the (only) writer-in-residence at a Christian Retreat Center in Southern India, and encounter, on a desert island in the Arabian Sea, the last person on Earth he wants to face. Somewhere in there: he will turn fifty. Through it all, there is his first love. And there is his last. Because, despite all these mishaps, missteps, misunderstandings and mistakes, Less is, above all, a love story. A scintillating satire of the American abroad, a rumination on time and the human heart, a bittersweet romance of chances lost, by an author The New York Times has hailed as "inspired, lyrical," "elegiac," "ingenious," as well as "too sappy by half," Less shows a writer at the peak of his talents raising the curtain on our shared human comedy.

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"You can’t help but wonder if it’s not enough to simply live one life, but you have to try on a few others while you’re at it."

Less (Winner of the Pulitzer Prize)

By Andrew Sean Greer