Fiction at Literati: Caitlin Horrocks

Monday, August 19, 2019 - 7:00pm

As part of our ongoing Fiction at Literati Series, we welcome Michigan author Caitlin Horrocks in support of her latest novel, The Vexations, A kaleidoscopic debut novel about love, family, genius, and the madness of art, circling the life of eccentric composer Erik Satie and La Belle Époque Paris, from a writer who is "wildly entertaining" (San Francisco Chronicle), "startlingly ingenious" (Boston Globe), and "impressively sharp" (New York Times Book Review). Book signing to follow. Free and open to the public.

About the book: Erik Satie begins life with every possible advantage. But after the dual blows of his mother's early death and his father's breakdown upend his childhood, Erik and his younger siblings -- Louise and Conrad -- are scattered. Later, as an ambitious young composer, Erik flings himself into the Parisian art scene, aiming for greatness but achieving only notoriety.

As the years, then decades, pass, he alienates those in his circle as often as he inspires them, lashing out at friends and lovers like Claude Debussy and Suzanne Valadon. Only Louise and Conrad are steadfast allies. Together they strive to maintain their faith in their brother's talent and hold fast the badly frayed threads of family. But in a journey that will take her from Normandy to Paris to Argentina, Louise is rocked by a severe loss that ultimately forces her into a reckoning with how Erik -- obsessed with his art and hungry for fame -- will never be the brother she's wished for.

With her buoyant, vivid reimagination of an iconic artist's eventful life, Caitlin Horrocks has written a captivating and ceaselessly entertaining novel about the tenacious bonds of family and the costs of greatness, both to ourselves and to those we love.

 

Caitlin Horrocks is the author of the story collection This Is Not Your City and a recipient of the O. Henry Prize, the Pushcart Prize, and the Plimpton Prize. Her fiction has appeared in The New YorkerThe Atlantic, the Paris Review, Tin HouseOne Story, and elsewhere and has been included in The Best American Short Stories. She lives with her family in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Event address: 
124 E. Washington St.
Ann Arbor, MI 48104
Books: 
The Vexations By Caitlin Horrocks Cover Image
$28.00
Email info@literatibookstore.com or call for price
ISBN: 9780316316910
Published: Little, Brown and Company - July 30th, 2019