An Available Man: A Novel (edition 2012)

A happily married man on the verge of retirement and the good life with his beloved spouse is suddenly confronted with the loss of his wife and "life after death." I enjoyed this book as told from the perspective of the widowed gentleman.

This is the only book I've read by Hilma Wolitzer, but feel the read was worthy of checking out her other books. ( )

This review also appears on my blog:
An">http://mswordopolis.blogspot.com/2012/03/available-man-by-wilma-holitzer.html.

An Available Man is my favorite kind of novel, and it’s my favorite novel I’ve read this year so far as well: it’s a comedy of manners, it’s very astute about its characters and their interior lives, and it’s beautifully written.


The titular available man is Edward Schuyler, a recently widowed biology teacher in his early sixties. His stepchildren and step-daughter-in-law place a personal ad for him in the New York Review of Books, and this book follows his adventures and misadventures in the dating world of a sixty-something man. The story moves between suburban New Jersey and New York City (his home and work bases), and it covers the first three years of life without his beloved wife Bea.


The story draws you in from the beginning because it begins with Edward alone and remembering Bea’s struggle with pancreatic cancer as well as their relationship. You also feel sorry for him because he was left at the altar by his first serious partner, Laurel. Wolitzer also draws you in with the details that make the characters feel very vivid: Edward buries the letters responding to the personal ad in the kitchen’s crazy drawer, which is just how this character would describe what I would call a junk drawer. He’s too buttoned-up to call it a junk drawer.


There are several delicious set pieces in the story as well: Edward at his first dinner party as a widower and Edward’s semi-disastrous dates with women who responded to his personal ad. Wolitzer has a sense of humor. None of the characters, including the women he meets along the way, are caricatures or flat: Wolitzer clearly has affection for all of her characters, including his needy stepdaughter Julie, Edward’s mother-in-law Gladys, and even the dogwalker Mildred who’s interested in the occult. The family life feels real, and the places Edward inhabits feel real.


This is a story about grief, this is a story about the dating lives of widows and widowers, and this is a portrait of marriage. Nothing is easy for these set of characters, but they are interesting and are striving to become more alive, which makes for an interesting read.




An Available Man by Hilma Wolitzer
Ballantine
Publication date: January 24, 2012
Source: Publisher via NetGalley ( )

Could not even finish. ( )

I'm not sure what I think of this book. I found the premise interesting and the cover art baffling, but mostly I found that what was purported to be a gradual lifting of bereavement as a widower moved on with his life seemed startlingly quick as more than two years (or was it three years...or four?) was crammed into fewer than 300 pages. The passage of time was jumpy; the seasons passed jerkily and suddenly and the present would often be interrupted by a series of scenes from the recent past. I had trouble figuring out where I was in the course of the action of the book.

The character development was a bit lacking, which made the actions of the characters not really make sense to me. Even Edward, from whose point of view we see the story, seems fairly unknowable to me. It's one thing for him to surprise himself, but I think the author ought to know what his motivations are and ought to clue in her audience.

Despite these complaints, I enjoyed reading the book overall, and some parts I enjoyed quite a bit. I liked the characters of Gladys and Mildred, both of whom seemed more complex than many of the others. I liked Olga, too, until the second half of the book when she, too, seemed to change too quickly for my taste. I liked her more aloof.

I really enjoyed the description of the restoration work on the tapestries, and, unlike his professed interest in birding, I really believed that Edward was interested in this work, too. I wish there'd been more of this, but then, I think I would have enjoyed the book more had it gone deeper than it did in most respects. ( )

Widower, Edward Schuyler, meets stereotypical women as he begins to date after his wife, Bea's death. Ed is in his early 60s. He starts off with the sex crazed widow. He moves on to the widow who can't let go of her deceased husband, the 71 year old widow who looks (in the dim lighting) around 60+ due to major cosmetic surgery, the divorcee who reunites with her ex and finally lands his old girl friend/fiancee--the one who left him at the alter.

Bea's friends keep trying to set him up. He ultimately falls in love with a person who he disliked in the beginning.

This is a mediocre book at best...very predictable, uninspiring and flat. ( )

There, I've done it. I've tagged this as romance. That will probably ensure it never makes it onto the reading lists of my more intellectual LibraryThing friends (Hi Jeniwren!). And that's probably as it should be. I defend myself for giving it 3 and a half stars by saying that although it is in the end romance, it does make some sort of honest attempt to come to terms with the situation of the older (60-ish) widower. I related to his near-retirement situation and having children who are going through their own partnering issues, as well as having a mother who's demise could be only a late night phone call away.

Well, having said that, I have to ask whether people of this age are really as keen on sex as Hilma Wolitzer would seem to believe. Both the widower and his potential partners seem to be ready to get into bed after the first date, like a 20 year old. Geez, that's not my take on what being 60 is all about, but I'm only 59, so what would I know? Also my partner is alive and well.

This is undoubtedly a light read, and I find Wolitzer's style quite digestible. It's kind of a sorbet between heavy courses. It's mildly amusing in parts and has enough realism to keep me going. I suppose I did read it with a sense of putting myself in the protagonist's shoes, in a "what if" situation, despite my partner's current excellent health. ( )

This story of a man navigating the world of relationships and dating is sometimes poignant, sometimes funny. I didn't really connect with it, but it was a decent read. ( )

Received this book from Early Bird and found it quite enjoyable. I enjoy romance involving older adults that is intelligent and presents second time around romance with the complications of grief, adult children and old flames. Of course its fairly rare and wholly welcome to have a man's perspective nicely done.
Readalikes that occur to me would include Major Pettigrew's Last Stand, but also a couple of older books, Bed and Breakfast by Lois Battle and Night Gardening by Swann. Oh, and the wonderful Jeanne Ray.

I really enjoyed this book. There are no really deep issues being dealt with, no controversial topics creating tension, only the grief that Edward Schuyler struggles to deal with following the loss of his wife, Bee. He has a full life but can't quite move on. Then, just as his wife had predicted, well-meaning, but lonely widows begin to contact him and his children place a personal ad on him in a literary paper, The New York Review of Books. His dating experiences are both funny and sad. He even reconnects with his first real love, and eventually finds his love where least expected. ( )

charming! ( )

I just don't seem to be caught up in fiction anymore. But Wolitzer has written a very real feeling book about struggling to emerge back into life after the death of a spouse.

Most of the characters were rather 2 dimensional--some even less than that! But in the end, the character that counted made you glad you were able to get to know him. ( )

A widower finds love again. ( )

Maybe not the best book of the year but so enjoyable. Nice change a man presented in a woman's voice. ( )

A nice, easygoing companion of a book. ( )

Hilma Wolitzer’s newest novel set in New York City is a funny, perceptive love story about a high school teacher’s journey from grief to new love after the death of his wife. Edward Schuyler is a healthy, well-respected man in his early sixties. Following Bee’s death from cancer, he is bombarded with food and attention from his wife’s single friends and responses to a personal ad his children placed in a magazine. At his first party with old friends after Bee’s death, he is blindsided when one of the women physically throws herself at him. To paraphrase Jane Austen, it is a truth universally acknowledged that an available man of a certain age is a great catch. Or as Bee said to Edward toward the end of her life, “Look at you. They’ll be crawling out of the woodwork.”
Wolitzer uses flashbacks to provide insight into Bee’s down-to-earth character, as Edward draws on Bee’s sharp social observations to navigate his new world. These flashbacks also reveal the intimate, domestic details of a comfortable home and loving marriage. Edward is an appealing, vulnerable character confused by his grief and single status after years of marriage. His family, including a stepdaughter and stepson involved in their own dramas, his humorous but grieving mother-in-law, and his colleagues at work add depth and color to Edward’s history. The New York City setting and the cultural manners of educated urban dwellers are finely rendered by Wolitzer’s descriptions. If the novel were made into a film, Nora Ephron would be an excellent choice for screenwriter and director. An Available Man is a good choice for readers who have enjoyed novels such as The Three Weissmanns of Westport by Cathleen Schine and Then She Found Me by Elinor Lipman. ( )

After a failed love affair, leaving him waiting at the altar, it takes about 2 decades for Edward Schuyler to find the love of his life, Bea Silver. She comes with a ready made family for him to love and enjoy. Sadly, about two decades later, Bea succumbs to Cancer. Her children, from her first marriage, secretly place a personal ad for him, in the local paper, not wanting him to face a life of loneliness. They do not want to see him overwhelmed with sorrow and are hoping to send him down the road to recovery.
Edward, however, has grown content to be on his own, dealing with his isolation, ironing Bea’s blouses to maintain his closeness to her, keeping her clothing in the closet to retain her scent, until finally her friends come in, en masse, to clean everything out for him. He resists reentry into the world of dating and the company of others. His first attempts to mingle are fairly disastrous, but eventually he becomes more comfortable with himself and the women who seek him out.
The book examines the human emotions of loss and renewal, as well as the solitude of single life for women and men, of varied ages. As Edward grapples with his widowed status, he is portrayed as shy and retiring, more laid back than outgoing, and the women are portrayed with one foot in the marriage bed and one foot at the altar. Even married friends think he is fair game. Approached by single and married women, he is truly the available man, and the women are hungry for him. Although his early efforts at dating are a dismal failure, as he recovers from his bereavement, he too, begins to hunger for women and sex.
I thought that the plot seemed a little contrived, although it did honestly depict the fact that women seem to have to more aggressively search for a man, while the man simply has to sit back and wait for opportunities to find him. Yet, it made the women a tad too aggressive and needy to feel totally real, even providing a 71 year old woman who attempts to seduce him, albeit in the dark. He is a 62 year old “available man, and although, as a teacher, he has a modest financial nest egg, he is not what one would call a great catch, unless all that counts is that everything is in working order. So, in that way, I thought the book overdid his availability. He was simply a man and I would think women would want more than a body, which is not how they were portrayed it in this book. The women seemed shallow, simply searching for a pair of pants, rather than an engaging partner, and I thought the treatment of them was a little disrespectful.
The book was well executed, though; it was very easy to read and/or listen to, as I did, but I felt it was a little wanting in depth. In the face of such loss, the family dynamic did not always feel genuine. Would the children really place a personal ad for their stepfather? Would the man really be so disinterested for so long and seem so naïve about all the women trying to attract him? Are most women so desperate and forward? Yes, I know that women sometimes seem hungrier than men do, when they are adrift and alone, but too many of the women in this book seemed to be caricatures of lonely women with nothing on their mind but the communal bed and with no real interest in a relationship of the mind, at all. The women were just depicted as too shallow for my liking.
Overall though, it was a poignant tale dealing with emotional immaturity, emotional illness, loneliness and loss and how we attempt to deal with our grief and solitude, ultimately healing, so we lead a more productive and happy life. ( )

Edward Schuyler has become a widower at age sixty-two. His beloved wife, Bee, is gone and Edward is in mourning. And he finds himself the object of attention from several single women and well-meaning friends. But he doesn’t feel ready to step out. Finally his stepchildren take matters into their own hands and place an ad in the Personals section of the New York Review of Books. With reluctance, Edward begins to read through the many responses and chooses a few to call.

This is a warm tale of a man’s journey in the next phase of his life. There are chances to take and mistakes to make as Edward finds his life is not over after all. And I enjoyed going along. ( )

This tender, and sometimes very funny novel, tells the story of Edward Schuyler--how he copes with grief following the death of his beloved wife, Bee, and how he finds love the second time around. I laughed out loud and shed a few tears during my time with Edward. Wolitzer's writing was both descriptively lush when needed and sublimely sparse when demanded. ( )

This novel turned out to be so much more than I expected. It centers on the likeable, grieving sixty-something Edward, who has just lost his wife Bee to cancer. Edward is confronted with heartwrenching grief, while trying to fend off the well-meaning attempts of others to help him “move on.”

The story is gripping from the beginning and Edward is a beloved character you immediately root for. He is so well-written that I found myself experiencing his feelings as I read the story. His grief process is realistic and poignantly described.

As Edward approaches the one year anniversary of Bee’s death, his friends begin a not-so-subtle campaign to set him up, and his family puts an ad in the personals for him. Soon, a stunned Edward is bombarded with women. From awkward fix-ups at dinner parties, to a date with a widow which becomes a memorial to her dead husband, Edward’s first forays back into the dating world are rendered with believable hilarity and poignancy.

A touching story of a man starting over, at a point in his life when he thought he’d be settling into retirement with the love of his life, this is a well-written depiction of “dating after death” with an unforgettable cast of characters. ( )

Right from the start, I enjoyed this book. It's about how a widower makes his way back to a relationship with a woman after his beloved wife died. It's a book that you will be thinking about, will keep returning to, because you so hope that things will turn out well for him. There is a twist in the story that I didn't anticipate...it's always nice to be surprised by the story! I definitely recommend this book. ( )

Edward Schuyler is a recently widowed, bookish sixty-two-year-old science teacher. An available older man will get a lot of attention from the ladies, especially when he’s not only unattached, but also handsome and healthy.

Edward receives phone calls from widows wanting to meet for lunch, friends surreptitiously set him up on dates at dinner parties, and even his own children try to help with his social life by placing an ad in the personals of The New York Review. It read: “Science Guy. Erudite and kind, balding but handsome. Our widowed dad is the real thing for the right woman.”

Edward is still mourning the loss of his wife, Bee, and prefers the familiar routine of work, gardening, and bird-watching. Gradually Edward begins to reconcile his feelings of loyalty to Bee and the need to move on with his life, and that includes romantic relationships with women.

The book is a nicely written, easy read. It is tender and charming with just the right amount of humor. There is an interesting cast of secondary characters surrounding Edward including his step-children, mother-in-law, friends and co-workers and Edward’s relationships with them are nicely developed.

For the most part I enjoyed the book but there was one thing that annoyed me. At one point the plot took what I can only call a “weird turn”, and to describe my feelings in detail would be a spoiler. Edward begins a relationship that is very unbelievable and does not fit with what we have been told about him. Not that people don’t get involved in wrong relationships, they do, but this is an intelligent, stable man who should know better based on his past experiences. Also, there is a lot of foreshadowing in this relationship that never comes to pass and I’m still trying to figure out how this particular woman added to the story.

Other than my one plot objection and perhaps a too nicely tied up ending, an overall pleasant read. ( )

I enjoyed this book very much. I loved the development of the main character and found the course of the plot to be surprising. I recommend this book. ( )

An Available Man is a quiet read and is just the ticket for a reader who wants to get to know the characters and visit the scenes as a fly on the wall or bird in the tree. Edward has just lost the love of his life, his wife Bea, and soon after is inundated with dates or fix-ups. His stepdaughters, his friends and neighbors all just want him to not be alone and help him by placing a personal ad. This sets off a series of letters and blind dates that are funny and poignant but leave him still missing his wife and more out of sorts. When he does meet someone that peaks his interest an old fiance appears out of the blue and shakes things up. Will Edward's life ever work itself out despite everyone's good intentions? The book will appeal to lovers of Major Pettigrew Takes a Stand and all of us who have lost someone we love. I received this book as an advance copy and have already recommended it to many people. ( )

I cannot imagine losing a spouse, yet Edward had to endure just that when Bea succumbed to cancer at a relatively young age, leaving behind her elderly mother and her two children from a previous marriage. Edward's fight against loneliness (most times) were valiant, other times he gave in to the need to be alone and spent the night at home with the dog and a carry-out pizza. But slowly he moves on with life, never forgetting Bea, but more importantly, never forgetting himself. I enjoyed this story and will share it with adults who could use a dose of un-sensationalized reality to bring them back to life as it actually is, and how they must live in the face of sadness, heart ache, and well...life.

I received this book from the publisher as part of LT's Early Reviewer group. I very much appreciate the novel, and will be recommending the title to parties I believe will like Edward's sad, honest reality. ( )

The story of a widower who is a bit lost, a bit lonely and truly confused about how he will manage this new life as a widower. I really liked Edward. The story was fast, the characters well developed, the scope not so broad that you didn't feel it tried too hard. All in all, I thought it was a fun read and will be recommending it as a future read for my book club. This should provide good conversations about what men of a certain age are thinking, or not thinking. I liked this so much more than Major Pettigrew's Last Stand. (Which I thought felt like a slow boat to England) An Available Man had me smiling, wondering how my husband would react to losing me, thinking about women of a certain age on the prowl, and enjoying the scenery of NYC and surrounding area as the backdrop to the story. Don't take it too seriously, it is not supposed to be a roadmap through beareavement, just a good character driven story. I liked it. ( )