"Tragic and redemptive . . . Updike had Rabbit, Roth has Zuckerman,
Richard Ford has Bascombe and Begley has Schmidt. . . . [Schmidt Steps
Back] is the most ambitious novel [yet] in the Schmidt
cycle."--Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
Full of dark humor, compassion, and heart, Schmidt Steps Back is the
most romantic installment yet of the drama that began with the acclaimed
About Schmidt. Now seventy-eight, and just as passionate, sharp, and
endearingly prickly as ever, Albert Schmidt faces a life alone, with
only the crumbs of grandfatherly status and a less-than-demanding
position at an international organization to sustain him. His only hope
is Alice Verplanck, the French widow of a former partner, as elusive as
she is beautiful. Whether his rusty seduction skills can lure her from
Paris to the Hamptons won't be known, though, until Schmidt endures one
more ordeal by fire. Hilarious, engrossing, and deeply poignant,
Schmidt Steps Back is Louis Begley's finest novel yet.
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Praise for Schmidt Steps Back
"Engaging . . . Begley gets as close to Schmidt as a diarist, inhabiting
this man who has been seasoned by a long life."--The New York Times
Book Review
"Begley gets inside Schmidt's fertile WASP brain . . . with subtlety,
intelligence, and wit."--The Philadelphia Inquirer
"The novel grows in Begley's excellent intricacy . . . to the level of
art rather than manners. . . . One cannot read one of the Schmidt novels
without laughing."--San Francisco Chronicle
"Thoroughly absorbing . . . [a] cause for celebration."--Salon
"[A] superb tragicomedy . . . seductive, subversive, and
commanding."--*Booklist (*starred review)
