The Boy
Lara Santoro, 2013
Little, Brown, and Company
“Fierce....The Boy achieves startling power because of Ms. Santoro's refusal to soften the edges of her riveting main character, who hates and loves at hot-blooded extremes....Ms. Santoro has made her all too human.”
— Sam Sacks, Wall Street Journal
THE Boy
Anna has always been a risk-taker and a free spirit, but now she is raising a young daughter on her own and she has to play it safe. Her twenty-something neighbor with the slow, easy smile is in no way part of Anna's plans. She resists temptation in every way she can, yet Anna is soon drawn into a reckless and obsessive affair.
Provocative, headlong, and utterly compelling, The Boy is the story of a woman on the edge, torn between love and compulsion, desire and duty. Lara Santoro writes in "hypnotic and swiftly paced" prose (Daniel Woodrell) about the hazards of passion and motherhood and about one woman's unthinkable rebellion.
“The Boy unfolds with terse, impressionistic rapidity-like a spare, brutalist modern fairy tale....You can’t turn away.”
“Lara Santoro’s The Boy is both a swift and seductive novel. To experience such brutal beauty is why I read fiction.”
“Lara Santoro is a brilliant novelist whose vision is fierce and unsparingly clear. The Boy is a beautiful, brutally sensuous novel.”
“I read it in one go, with my heart in my mouth. Witty, compulsive, sensuous, and brutally honest about the price of motherhood.”
“I read this novel in one sitting and was mesmerized, addicted, charmed, jealous. The Boy is gorgeous, fiercely intelligent, deeply honest, and incredibly entertaining.”
“The Boy is beautifully written, beguiling in its fashion, hypnotic and swiftly paced. Lara Santoro tells a morally complicated and edgy story and doesn’t retreat, but stays true to her music. The word brave comes to mind, as does masterful.”
“Lara Santoro drills deep down, to the maelstrom of desire and despair that we cover up with the stories we tell ourselves. Unflinching and passionate, fierce and tender, The Boy is both a love story between parents and children, and a coming-of-age story for all women who are old enough to know better. It broke my heart.”