Equal Affections

Equal Affections tells the story of the funny, loving, and tragic Cooper family. Louise, the indomitable matriarch, has had cancer for twenty years. Her son Danny, a lawyer, lives in a New Jersey suburb with his lover Walter, who is slowly growing obsessed with on-line sex; her daughter April is a lesbian activist and folk singer, who knows how to perform a do-it-yourself artificial insemination using basic kitchen utensils. As Louise battles the slow withdrawal of her husband and the ravages of her disease, and as the entire Cooper family struggles to come to terms with her illness, David Leavitt reveals the profound depth and compassion of his narrative command. "Leavitt has written from the point of view of a raging, self-dramatizing mother with clarity and with such compassion that we understand her bitterness and mourn her lost chances.” –– The New York Times Book Review

Publishers Weekly

Leavitt's assured and convincing second novel, after The Lost Language of Cranes , follows the four members of the Cooper family through the mother's illness and death. Louise has lived with lymphatic cancer for a long time, all through Danny and April's growing-up years in northern California; now April's successful singing career has made her a feminist leader, and Danny practices law in New York. While focusing primarily on Danny and the impact of his family connections on his long-term relationship with Walt, another lawyer with whom he lives in New Jersey, Leavitt gives rounded, affectionate treatment to the others as well: Louise, whose bitter present includes cherished secrets of a wild past; Nat, who finds solace for dashed dreams with his mistress; April, whose bisexuality is at odds with her feminism; and even Walt, who scours the gay computer networks and thinks about leaving Danny. In understated, perfectly targeted prose, Leavitt illuminates the ordinariness of his characters, giving them and their sorrows and joys a long-lasting afterglow. 50,000 first printing; author tour. (Jan.)