Now a PBS Masterpiece television miniseries starring Tom Hollander
and Saskia Reeves
Longlisted for the Man Booker Prize
David Nicholls brings the wit and intelligence that graced his
enormously popular New York Times bestseller, One Day, to a
compellingly human, deftly funny new novel about what holds marriages
and families together--and what happens, and what we learn about
ourselves, when everything threatens to fall apart.
Douglas Petersen may be mild-mannered, but behind his reserve lies a
sense of humor that, against all odds, seduces beautiful Connie into a
second date . . . and eventually into marriage. Now, almost three
decades after their relationship first blossomed in London, they live
more or less happily in the suburbs with their moody seventeen year-old
son, Albie. Then Connie tells him she thinks she wants a divorce.
The timing couldn't be worse. Hoping to encourage her son's artistic
interests, Connie has planned a month-long tour of European capitals, a
chance to experience the world's greatest works of art as a family, and
she can't bring herself to cancel. And maybe going ahead with the
original plan is for the best anyway? Douglas is privately convinced
that this landmark trip will rekindle the romance in the marriage, and
might even help him to bond with Albie.
Narrated from Douglas's endearingly honest, slyly witty, and at times
achingly optimistic point of view, Us is the story of a man trying to
rescue his relationship with the woman he loves, and learning how to get
closer to a son who's always felt like a stranger. Us is a moving
meditation on the demands of marriage and parenthood, the regrets of
abandoning youth for middle age, and the intricate relationship between
the heart and the head. And in David Nicholls's gifted hands, Douglas's
odyssey brings Europe--from the streets of Amsterdam to the famed
museums of Paris, from the cafés of Venice to the beaches of
Barcelona--to vivid life just as he experiences a powerful awakening of
his own. Will this summer be his last as a husband, or the moment when
he turns his marriage, and maybe even his whole life, around?
