Books › The Brooklyn Follies
The Brooklyn Follies
A Novel
First published 2005 · 461 pages
A warm, meandering love letter to human imperfection and the unexpected second acts found on the sidewalks of Brooklyn.
What it feels like
Reading this novel feels like taking a long, aimless autumn walk through Brooklyn with a wry, intelligent friend who has seen the worst of life but decided to laugh at it anyway. The pace is decidedly meandering, inviting you to linger in used bookstores, corner diners, and the messy, intersecting lives of eccentric urbanites. It trades cold postmodernism for a warm, Dickensian coziness, wrapping the reader in a bittersweet but ultimately life-affirming atmosphere. The prose is conversational and effortlessly fluid, carrying a quiet philosophical weight beneath its comic surface. It will deeply delight readers who cherish character-driven stories about found family, the absurdity of human folly, and the quiet grace of starting over when you thought your story was already finished.
- Mood
- autumnal
- cozy
- bittersweet
- urban-nostalgic
- Tone
- wry
- affectionate
- philosophical
- melancholic
- warm
- Pace
- meandering
- Themes
- second chances · found family · human absurdity · mortality and aging · healing power of storytelling
- The writing
- Clean, conversational, and deceptively simple, with a gentle cadence that feels like listening to an articulate friend over coffee.
- The arc
- From isolated resignation and quiet despair to a warm, unexpected embrace of life's messy connections.
- Who it's for
- Readers who love character-driven, slightly eccentric urban tales about flawed people finding redemption through community and literature.
Content notes
- terminal illness
- grief
- divorce
- 9/11 references
About the book
Nathan Glass has come to Brooklyn to die. Divorced, estranged from his only daughter, the retired life insurance salesman seeks only solitude and anonymity. Then Nathan finds his long-lost nephew, Tom Wood, working in a local bookstore - a far cry from the brilliant academic career he'd begun when Nathan saw him last. Tom's boss is the charismatic Harry Brightman, whom fate has also brought to the "ancient kingdom of Brooklyn, New York." Through Tom and Harry, Nathan's world gradually broadens to include a new set of acquaintances - not to mention a stray relative or two - and leads him to a reckoning with his past life.
Description from Open Library.
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