Next

Starred review from January 18, 2010
In this funny, surprising, and sobering novel, Hynes (Kings of Infinite Space
) follows Kevin Quinn, who has flown to Austin, Tex., for a job interview at the height of a terrorism scare. Kevin, an editor at the University of Michigan, has grown as frustrated by academic politics as he is by his relationship with his shallow girlfriend. On the flight, he sits next to Kelly, a beautiful and enigmatic young woman who reminds him of a great lost love of his youth. With time to kill before his interview, Kevin spends the first half of the novel surreptitiously following Kelly around Austin while reminiscing about his misspent youth and failed relationships. The casual but persistent self-absorption of Kevin's reveries is both funny and off-putting, and when contrasted with the threat of terrorism and his shadowing of the young woman, gives the novel a creepy energy that fully kicks in after Kevin is knocked unconscious, and Hynes pushes the plot into unchartered territory. The final 50 pages are unlike anything in the recent literature of our response to terrorism—a tour de force of people ennobled in the face of random horror.

March 1, 2010
At 55, Kevin Quinn is the kind of excessively worried man who makes women of a certain age grind their teeth. He is so averse to relationship commitment that he secretly flies from Ann Arbor, MI, to Austin, TX, for a job interview while his (sort of) live-in (sort of) girlfriend is out of town on business. Solipsistic to a fault, he rigidly judges any female he runs into by her physical attributes, no matter how casual the encounter. His one-day visit to Austin does not go well. Battling the crippling heat, he finds himself stalking the beautiful (of course) young woman who sat next to him on the plane, until he is injured in an encounter with a dog on a leash. A beautiful (of course) thoracic surgeon briefly comes to his rescue. Throughout all these misadventures, Kevin replays several intimate scenarios with past lovers. Hynes ("The Lecturer's Tale") has an ability to evoke sounds, smells, and contempt that lures his readers to a place they don't see coming. VERDICT Fans of Elizabeth Strout's "Olive Kitteridge" will embrace Hynes's distasteful albeit oddly likable protagonist, and the shock value of the ending will cause considerable buzz. [See Prepub Alert, "LJ" 11/15/09.]Beth E. Andersen, Ann Arbor Dist. Lib., MI

Copyright 2010 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

February 15, 2010
Propelled by a crisis in his relationship with a live-in lover and his frustration with his university publishing job, 50-year-old Michigander Kevin Quinn boards a plane for Austin, Texas, headed to a job interview. His wild hopes for a new life in a new city vie with his ever-burgeoning neuroses, which are triggered by his fear of flying, compounded by his fear of terrorists, and further complicated by his attraction to the young Asian American girl sitting next to him on the plane. Once in Austin, he proceeds to stalk his seatmate, becomes injured in a fall, and trades intimate secrets with a stranger. Amid all the fumbling action, he obsessively catalogs his past relationships, minutely dissecting every rejection, sexual thrill, and breakup. Kevins wickedly funny rants about academic politics and air disasters alternate with his painful (and sometimes painfully tedious) cataloging of romantic humiliation, all leading up to a shocking finale that is hinted at but never telegraphed. Through his neurotic Everyman, Hynes (Kings of Infinite Space, 2004) offers provocative insights into the troubling times in which we live.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2010, American Library Association.)