The Kingdom of Sand: A Novel [Paperback]

ANEW YORK TIMES BOOK REVIEWEDITORS CHOICE AND PAPERBACK ROW

[Hollerans] new novel is all the more affecting and engaging because the images of isolation and old age here are haunted . . . In 1978 Holleran wrote the quintessential novel about gay abandon, the sheer, careless pleasure of it:Dancer from the Dance. Now, at almost eighty years of age, he has produced a novel remarkable for its integrity, for its readiness to embrace difficult truths and for its complex way of paying homage to the passing of time. Colm T?ib?n,The New York Times Book Review

Its rare to find fiction that takes this kind of dying of the light as its subject and doesnt make its heroes feel either pathetic or polished with a gleam of false dignity . . . This sad, beautiful book captures the sensations Hollerans characters are chasingas well as the darkness that inevitably comes for them, and us. Mark Athitakis,Los Angeles Times

One of the great appeals of Florida has always been the sense that the minute you get here you have permission to collapse.

The Kingdom of Sandis a poignant tale of desire and dreadAndrew Hollerans first new book in sixteen years. The nameless narrator is a gay man who moved to Florida to look after his aging parentsduring the height of the AIDS epidemicand has found himself unable to leave after their deaths. With gallows humor, he chronicles the indignities of growing old in a small town.

At the heart of the novel is the story of his friendship with Earl, whom he met cruising at the local boat ramp. For the last twenty years, he has been visiting Earl to watch classic films together and critique the neighbors. Earl is the only person in town with whom he can truly be himself. Now Earls health is failing, and our increasingly misanthropic narrator must contend with the fact that once Earl dies, he will be completely alone. He distracts himself with sexul“|