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Published Apr 2016
416 pages
Genre: Literary Fiction
Publication Information
Inspired by the author's life, Alice & Oliver is a deeply affecting novel written with stunning reserves of compassion, humor, and wisdom. Alice Culvert is an extraordinary character - a woman of incredible heart and spirit - who will remain in memory long after the final page.
Award-winning and New York Times bestselling author Charles Bock earned vast critical acclaim for his debut novel, Beautiful Children. Now, in Alice & Oliver, he has created an unflinching yet deeply humane portrait of a young family's journey through a medical crisis, laying bare a couple's love and fears as they fight for everything that's important to them.
New York, 1993. Alice Culvert is a caring wife, a doting new mother, a loyal friend, and a soulful artist - a fashion designer who wears a baby carrier and haute couture with equal aplomb. In their loft in Manhattan's gritty Meatpacking District, Alice and her husband, Oliver, are raising their infant daughter, Doe, delighting in the wonders of early parenthood.
Their life together feels so vital and full of promise, which makes Alice's sudden cancer diagnosis especially staggering. In the span of a single day, the couple's focus narrows to the basic question of her survival. Though they do their best to remain brave, each faces enormous pressure: Oliver tries to navigate a labyrinthine healthcare system and handle their mounting medical bills; Alice tries to be hopeful as her body turns against her. Bracing themselves for the unthinkable, they must confront the new realities of their marriage, their strengths as partners and flaws as people, how to nourish love against all odds, and what it means to truly care for another person.
"Starred Review. A stunning book about Alice and Oliver , yes, but also about the way illness shatters us all." - Kirkus
"Starred Review. Informed by his own wife's illness and death, Bock's novel is a searingly honest, wryly funny, deeply loving tribute to those facing mortality and struggling through the maze of health insurance and treatment options while trying to hold on to their humanity." - Library Journal
"Interspersed throughout the first two-thirds of the novel are occasional 'Case Studies,'... Though it could have been worthwhile, this device peters out before it can add much depth. But overall, this book overcomes the standard clichés to provide a beautiful, complex portrait of a family in crisis." - Publishers Weekly
"Alice & Oliver is a wrenchingly powerful novel. Charles Bock chronicles the daily struggles of a young wife and mother facing her own imminent mortality." - Richard Price
"Charles Bock has stared down life's most difficult questions to write a truly revelatory, truly great book." - Joshua Ferris
"This novel laid me waste. It was so beautiful, so perfectly realized, so lavishly and gorgeously written, so eviscerating, and, most of all, so very true." - Ayelet Waldman
"This luminous and unforgettable novel will leave an indelible mark on the literature of our time." - Matthew Thomas
"Like other fine elegies, it is redemptive and devastating, testimony to a love so violently real that it seems to obliterate any other possible truth." - Andrew Solomon
"Charles Bock has written a profound and radiant novel, and what particularly amazes me is that he has created such beauty from the fluorescent lights of hospital corridors, from uncomfortable New York City apartments, from a family doing what it takes to survive." - Rivka Galchen
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