The Friend (National Book Award Winner), (Hardcover)

from RidgewayGirl

In this novel, an unnamed creative writing teacher mourns the loss of her dear friend, an author and professor. She takes in the author's Great Dane, Apollo, despite living in a small Manhattan apartment where dogs are not allowed. As she and the dog mourn the loss of the author, she shares memor...

from Jonez

3.5 Sigrid Nunez's The Friend reads as a diary of a woman mourning and slowly trying to make sense of the suicide of a fellow writer, mentor, and possibly a love that never came to fruition (I believe, because she could not be involved with someone she knew so well). The journal entry like conver...

from browner56

The Friend tells the story of a middle-aged author and creative writing teacher who is mourning the loss of her mentor and oldest friend. The deceased, himself a literature professor, recently committed suicide but has left no explanation for what seems to be an impulsive act. Beyond having to co...

from Jthierer

In case I needed further proof that writing "style" matters a great deal to me, I enjoyed this book much, much more than The Dutch House even though the same "nothing really happens" description applies. Nominally, this book is about a woman who adopts her friend's Great Dane after he commits sui...

from lisapeet

I found this to be cool to the touch in a way that didn't quite do justice to its subjects-grief, literature, male-female friendship, and the love of a good dog. It seemed more like an exercise than a novel, and all the literary references felt distancing, more like name-dropping, than contextual...