I enjoyed this one a lot. It was more dramatic and angsty than I expected, but I'm not sure where my expectations came from.

A humorous yet gentle novel about the all-too-human fear of aging, and discovering that middle-age can bring grace and even love.
See my full review at http://www.bookbarmy.com

Less is an endearing, funny travelogue of a man who runs away from his ex's wedding, only to find himself in the process. He engineers a trip around the world through awards, teaching engagements, writing opportunities, and other commitments, and his attempted distractions and fish out of water mishaps remind him the great loves of his past -- from being a younger man with an older one to the reversed situation, with some other flings and dalliances in between. The enforced solitude and removal from his routine winds up both improving his writing and his focus on his own life and needs, while providing a healthy dose of opportunities to laugh at himself and be humiliated through the characters, awkward situations, and mishaps he finds along the way.
If Less is a parallel for the author's reality, I can only imagine what the original novel was, before the charitable rewrite that came from his epiphanies towards the end.

I thought this would be fun and funny and gripping and witty and clever and it was just rote. Had hoped to like it.

Really enjoyed this. A unique premise - saying Yes to all the invitations. I'm instantly sold with novels featuring writers, particularly gay writers, so I was hooked with this. And Less' travels were fascinating,and very funny.

While this is a fun around-the-world romp about a somewhat confused man spurned by his longtime lover, I'm not sure I agree that it deserved the Pulitzer. I do love Greer's writing, but I much preferred The Story of A Marriage by him. However, if you're looking for a well written, fun read I would recommend this.

My thanks to NetGalley and Little, Brown and Company for providing me an advance copy of the book in exchange for this honest review.

This is really a lovely, charming, elegiac novel about the wistful disappointments that one inevitably faces as one grows older, and either does or doesn't find love, success and happiness. Arthur Less is a middling novelist fast approaching fifty, and looking backwards on his life with regret, and towards his unsettled future with trepidation. His younger lover of nine years has recently left him and is getting married to a new man, sending Less reeling around the world in a series of semi-comic flights from reality. Each chapter encompasses Less' adventures in a new foreign city, until he returns to his life in San Francisco ... and an unexpected and quite touching ending.

Greer writes exquisite prose, and if I am a decade too old to really appreciate (or much remember) the qualms of a fifty year old, anyone can relate to the foibles of pondering the roads less travelled. My major quibble is that most of the novel is shown from the vantage point of an omniscient narrator, with infrequent interpolations from a different narrator whose identity doesn't become crystal clear till the final pages. Although that second narrator is absolutely necessary for the powerful ending (and probably WOULDN'T have worked for the entire novel as a whole), it is somewhat jarring when he suddenly intervenes to commander the navigation of the story. Still a minor fault in what was a very touching and frequently funny read.

Andrew Sean Greer's newest novel sparkles--fresh, inventive, compelling and timely. A terrific read.

Arthur Less -- referred to as Less (the "is more" is silent but implied) -- is a self-defeating mess after his lover Freddy shacks up with someone else. Once Freddy is about to get married, however, Less loses it and takes off, distracting himself by traveling around the world, all whilst knowing what Freddy is up to now. While Less is in Berlin giving a reading at a nightclub, Freddy is walking up the aisle. While Less is kissing someone on a Paris rooftop, Freddy is on his way to Tahiti for his honeymoon.

Rather than fighting for his love (because isn't it ridiculous for a middle-aged man to love), he lets Freddy go, without acknowledging how much they meant to each other.

It's very difficult to connect with a man who would be so cowardly. With a man who would be so disconnected from his self as to not realize his own heart. And furthermore, with a man who was so up to his own neck with Impostor Syndrome, he requires his trusty blue (royal, not navy) suit to be his 'real' self, his 'bold' self. In short, this is a ridiculous man, and one difficult to sympathize with.

The book -- in a meta sort of way -- pins down what's wrong with it. It is difficult to empathize with a middle-aged, reasonably affluent, white man. Even if he's gay. Even if he's struck by anxiety. And especially if he can't figure out how lucky he is to have the life that he's had. Make that double-especially for being unwilling to fight for what he's loved.

Arthur Less is incredibly privileged and doesn't understand this, frustratingly so for the reader. The first half of the book is an exceptional slog because we see Arthur mired in self-doubt, worry, anxiety when he seems to be the only one in his circle of influence who thinks so.

But half-way through the book (and if it weren't for promising myself I'd review this for Netgalley, I wouldn't have made it that far), the first moment of brilliance shown through. It has to do with how Arthur Less loves, physically. He's not talented and even implies that, technically, he's a bad lover. Here's the quote:

"He kisses--how do I explain it? Like someone in love. Like he has nothing to lose. Like someone who has just learned a foreign language and can use only the present tense and only the second person. Only now, only you. There are some men who have never been kissed like that. There are some men who discover, after Arthur Less, that they never will be again."

In context, he's arrived in Germany to teach a five-week course on writing. He's speaking in German but speaks like a child. He isn't very good at it. Nevertheless, he is loved. And throughout the book, having appeared emotionally impotent, we get the first glimpse that this is not at all the case. And, in the end, it turns out that Arthur Less is both lovely and very much loved.

On the minus side, there is much that happens off-page. The reader is led to a small climax, only to have the climax itself (and the resolution) happen between the space where one section ends and the other begins. It's a theme, apparently, done on purpose, and, once again, self-referenced in the form of Proust and of having five summers to read the entire thing only to have it end 200 pages before it was supposed to, dropping the climax/resolution off into thin air, having lost the build-up, having not seen the end coming.

Oh, I suppose it is clever in a way. Experimenting with a time-honored formula to let tension rise, letting the promise of climax linger for the reader, only to have it taken away just like it does in real life. After all, who promised that things would happen the way they are meant to? On the other hand, it felt stunted--an easy excuse to veer away from the difficult emotions. Not that I expected the author to do all of the heavy-lifting; only that they would remain engaged enough to help me feel as if my guide in taking me on this journey weren't quite so invested in leaving me hanging.

The read was worthwhile. Hard work -- just as it must be to love Arthur Less -- but worthwhile.

I thank the publisher and netgalley for allowing me to read this book. Unfortunately, I didn't enjoy it and thus wasn't able to finish it or review it. Not much happened, but the writing was really nice.

A bit of a surprise all things considered. The hero is a man approaching fifty years with trepidation and approaching the wedding date of his lover of nine years to another with something more than trepidation. So, instead of sitting at home to face the prospect of both, off he goes to see the world through a chain of invitations he meant to decline, but now… the reader is off on a world-wide experience with Arthur Less.

When I say this book was a surprise, I meant that it was so much more than a down-hearted gay guy who thinks he’s hit his expiration date and roaming around the world. It dips back to reflect on his colorful past, distant and near, that led him to where he’s at in the present. His present day experiences and his reconciliation with his past start working on him as he contemplates his future.

Yes, it was very introspective, but it was wry with bittersweet musings. And let’s not forget the humor that only international travel mishaps can bring. And in the end, Less came into his own and I was happy to be there to see it because, for much of the book, Less never sees himself the way others around him and the reader sees him. He’s lived a grand, full life, but it takes a shifting of his world for him to finally see it.

Now, the surprises were not so welcome when I first started reading. It was not exactly what I thought I was getting so that took some adjusting. The writer’s style was another huge adjustment- it meanders, and in my copy, the dips into the past and the present are not delineated. A jump in time or narration thought can be from paragraph to paragraph so a few times I got twisted around. There is an omniscient narrator voice that will pop in mid-stream, too (that was a fun twist that I figured out and was happy to discover I was right).

Less is what I call ‘travel’ fiction though it doesn’t delve too deeply into the big sweeping sections of travel. I thought the author wove this part in organically so the reader had a good vista of Less’ travel stops, but it was alongside the adventure.

In summary, this turned out to be a book that I felt cozy with as I was there alongside Less for all his travels and epiphanies. It is one I would recommend, particularly if you enjoy ‘travel’ fiction, but also enjoy the protagonist who is introspective.

I rec’d this book from Net Galley in exchange for an honest review.

I love this book. I could go on and on about the main character, Arthur Less. He was one of the best characters in a book I've read in a long time. A failing novelist who can't find love and deals with it along the way. There's so many things that could go wrong in life, and Arthur Less is the champion of that happening to him. Above all, this story is about love and how it can bring you down and lift you up. 

This book definitely shows heartbreak. I resonate with these kind of books because I've seen love fall apart and mend back together. This book is so great because it would stand out to a lot of people for the same reason. So many people have had their hearts broken, whatever their sexual orientation is. Writing about something that so many people can talk about was definitely well done by the author. Andrew Greer really made me feel like he was the heartbroken one himself. He wrote this book so beautifully that it made me feel for Arthur on multiple occasions. 

Next, this book was so very quotable. There were many quotes that I will take from this book. I highlighted a lot on my Kindle, and I love when that happens because it shows how quotable a book really was. It seemed that every page had a different theme, but each theme wrapped into one big theme at the end. There was one specific quote I took from this and I think it was written in to each page: "Just for the record: happiness is not bullshit". And it's not. Arthur Less proves that through everything he goes through. 

This was absolutely wonderful to read. It was comforting because it shows that in the end, it will all work out. Arthur Less goes through a myriad of things and he comes out of it okay. It's a very important message, and it is displayed very well throughout this book on every single page you read. 

Overall, a beautiful, dazzling, comforting, heartbreaking read by Andrew Sean Greer and it was magnificent. I will be recommending it to a lot of people.

Like its notable progenitor, the "Henry Bech" short stories by John Updike, Sean Andrew Greer's Less chronicles the plights of a talented, but unknown novelist named Arthur Less. Less, a gay man on the brink of turning fifty, is an outsider to the literary world, much as Bech was in earlier days. They share an equally put-upon, yet sardonic take on their own life and times, and each seems unaware of just how gifted they are as writers and as human beings. What's unique about "Less" is its enticing structure; in order to avoid having to attend his former lover Freddy's wedding, Less embarks on an around-the-world journey highlighted by conferences, readings, prize ceremonies, and so on, in locales as exotic as Italy and India, with many stops in between. In the course of these travels, Less attempts to come to terms with aging, loss, the dwindling of narrative powers and the quixotic nature of "true love." And while the novel's structure starts to feel repetitious towards the latter half of the novel, Arthur Less remains an enormously sympathetic protagonist throughout. The insights Less delivers (care of his own creator, Greer) are piercing and often very funny. Highly recommended.

Approaching fifty can be very stressful (and I’m sure it definitely is) especially if you’re not married, don’t have children or are not accomplished in any way. Andrew Sean Greer introduces us to a new character and shows us the struggle and the comedy in nearing fifty and trying to come to terms with getting older and getting the most out of life.

What is so special about Arthur Less? He’s approaching the big five-oh, he’s a writer and he’s single but what lies beneath all of that is a man of many fears. Out of the blue an invitation to his ex-boyfriends wedding appears and makes Arthur Less question everything he’s ever known about himself. What does our hero Arthur Less decide to do? Why yes, accept every literary event invitation he has been putting off and go on a trip across the world, of course! Arthur Less will visit Paris, Berlin, go to Morocco, he’ll go to a writer’s retreat in Southern India and at last to a desert island in the Arabian Sea. On these trips Arthur will meet many people and go through many challenges and all of them will make him realize and question things about himself in a new way.

Being a twenty-year-old adolescent I cannot tell you if this book dealt with the aging theme in a spot on way but I can guess that it paints a pretty good picture of what it’s like to be a fifty-year-old gay man whose identity is coming to question because he’s getting older. Greer makes our main character very introspective which is exactly what gives Less a voice and makes him a real character. Our narrator in this novel is unknown but about halfway through the book you begin to get a feel of who the narrator might be which I personally enjoyed finding out. Arthur Less is such a great character who throughout the book I couldn’t stop following and caring for – which is proof that Greer is skilled at writing a complex character.

‘Not that I saw all that then, when he blushed and his eyes went down. I knew nothing of anxiety or other pointless human suffering. I only knew I had said the wrong thing.’

I have to note that this novel might not be for everyone because I have seen a few DNFs of this book based on it being too ‘slow’ and not too comical like the blurb says. My experience with it was very different even though I didn’t like the narration in the beginning of it after about 25% I got used to it and read on. I have to agree that it isn’t a ‘laugh-out -loud’ book but it has its moments!

I would like to thank NetGalley and the publisher (Little Brown US) for allowing me to read this book in exchange for an honest review.

This book is completely charming, endearing, and enjoyable. I can't recommend it highly enough. I hope it puts Andrew Greer squarely and permanently on the map of authors to know and love.

Thank you for approving me for this book. The blurb sounded interesting, and the reviews already posted prompted me to request it. Unfortunately, once I began reading this book, I realized it wasn't something I would enjoy. I've therefore marked it as Did Not Finish, without a rating.

Thanks again.

This one is not for me. It's in third person and I am having a hard time connecting. I only made it to about 15% so I don't really have an opinion on it.

It's been said (in a catty way, of course) that after age 42 gay men become invisible, that no one wants an older gay man except, if they're lucky, another gay man. Andrew Sean Greer's beautifully moving but slightly uneven new novel, Less, deals with a man coming to terms approaching his 50th birthday, wondering if he'll ever find true love, and trying to define himself and his career. No small feat, there!

When he was in his early 20s, he was the boyfriend of Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Robert Brownburn, who was a member of the famed Russian River School of writers and artists. Even though the relationship ended after a few years, Arthur has always been defined somewhat as the former boyfriend of Robert Brownburn, even as he experienced a slight bit of renown in his own literary career. Robert will always be Arthur's first love, even though Arthur knows he frittered away the relationship as many much-younger gay men would.

As Arthur's 50th birthday approaches, he is in the midst of a crisis. His former boyfriend of nine years (this time he picked someone younger) is getting married to someone else, and Arthur has been invited to the wedding. His publisher isn't interested at all in his newest novel. And he wonders if he'll spend the rest of his life alone, unloved and unsuccessful. So he does what any self-effacing person would do: he flees the country.

But he's not running away. (Well, yes he is.) He's pursuing a number of different literary opportunities across the globe, which will end with some time at a writer's retreat in India, where perhaps he will be able to fix what ails his novel. Along the way he travels to Mexico, Italy, Germany, France, and Morocco, plumbing the depths of his soul, looking back at the memories of relationships gone sour, and trying to figure out where he goes from here, and whether he's made the biggest mistakes of his life by simply deciding not to decide things, not to say things, not to do things.

How does a man who always seems to intrigue, always seems to provoke feelings in others, figure out his self-worth, and find the courage to act instead of waiting for things to happen to him? There are lessons to be learned in mistakes and failures, but does he want to learn those lessons? What awaits him on the other side of 50?

Less is an emotional, somewhat elegiacal meditation on aging, love, and one's professional and romantic legacy. It is at times poignant, at times funny, even a little ridiculous occasionally, but tremendously thought-provoking. Greer brings so much poetry and beauty to his sentences, and even if his main character is a somewhat elusive enigma, at least to the reader, his lamentations and his journey are utterly fascinating.

I enjoyed this book quite a bit. I felt as if so much of this story was so interesting, so moving, that I was a little irritated when the narrative veered into almost farcical and/or metaphysical territory a few times. In a sense you know how the story may ultimately unfold, but Greer makes you wait a really long time for the payoff, and there were a few moments I just wanted Arthur to stop moping, stop walking around with his head in the sand, and speak, or act, the way he knows he should.

I have been a huge fan of Greer's since reading his first story collection, How It Was for Me. While it took me a while to get into what is perhaps his most famous book, The Confessions of Max Tivoli, I absolutely loved his other books, The Path of Minor Planets, The Story of a Marriage, and The Impossible Lives of Greta Wells. He is an absolutely beautiful storyteller, and even though this book has some flaws, reading Greer's writing is like eating a fine meal or watching a beautiful movie or play—you just don't want it to end, you want to savor every minute.

NetGalley and Little, Brown and Company provided me an advance copy of the book in exchange for an unbiased review. Thanks for making this available!