New Releases by Louis Auchincloss

In this novel by the author of The Golden Calves set in 1930s high society, a young man recounts the people in his life and what he''s learned from them. This superb gallery of portraits gathers its wit and resonance from the discerning eye of the central narrator, Dan Ruggles, who in the course of unraveling the dreams, doubts, and loyalties of those around him inevitably reveals his own. Dan spends his boyhood in the company of old-money aunts from Bar Harbor and polo-playing uncles from Argentina. He stumbles upon the complexities of adulthood at Yale in the 1930s, and grows to worldly maturity at the Wall Street law firm that provides him not only with a vocation but with seemingly endless material for his fiction. Fellow passengers are the people in his life, each one a story and each one a lesson. Only Auchincloss can ferret out with such precision and understanding the secrets, foibles, and ironies that lie just beneath the proper Establishment surface. This is Louis Auchincloss at the top of his form—a book to please his many admirers and delightful introduction for new readers as well. Praise for Fellow Passengers "This gallery of American upper-class characters, Auchincloss''s 41st book, reflects the acutely perceptive insight that distinguishes much of his fiction. Lineage, the right schools, clubs and marriages are of crucial concern to the matrons, debutantes, establishment bankers and lawyers whose vapid lives, as revealed in these stories, often founder on underpinnings of dark secrets and skewed loyalties . . . . Richly entertaining vignettes." — Publishers Weekly

Twenty-three biographical essays on writers admired by the National Medal of Arts–winning author of The Education of Oscar Fairfax. For Louis Auchincloss, life and letters are not two things but one. It therefore comes as no surprise that when he writes about writers, their lives are considered as closely as their works. He takes what today is a refreshingly unpopular position: that the artist and his art cannot be teased apart, that biography of criticism and criticism biography. For Mr. Auchincloss, it all boils down to that maxim of Buffon''s: "the style''s the man," the man behind the book. The twenty-three writers discussed here are a mixed lot—English, American, and French; novelists, poets, and playwrights; Jacobeans, Victorians, and moderns—yet each has meant a great deal to Mr. Auchincloss as a reader and a writer. Some of them are classics, and familiar Auchincloss subjects: Sarah Orne Jewett, Henry James, Ivy Compton-Burnett. Others, among them Prosper Merimee, Harold Frederic, and Amy Lowell, were famous once but are now obscure. In their cases it is Mr. Auchincloss''s self-described task "to explore the reasons for their fall from grace," reasons that prove to be unfailingly personal as well as artistic. But as Mr. Auchincloss would rather praise and share than damn and dismiss, it is also his task "to seek the portions of their work that may still merit attention." Alfred Kazin once noted that Mr. Auchincloss''s essays are marked by "perfect literary grace and wit." These qualities have never been so evident as in this volume, an informal study of some of the author''s favorite books and the fascinating artists behind them.

The House of the Prophet is Louis Auchincloss''s searching novel of Felix Leitner, one of the most influential men of his time. Political philosopher, columnist, adviser to American presidents, Leitner will doubtless bring to many readers'' minds the late Walter Lippmann, portrayed in the fine biography by Ronald Steel. Indeed, in his new introduction, Auchincloss makes plain that "the idea of writing a novel inspired by, though by no means based upon, the life of Walter Lippmann was unlike any fictional idea that I have had before or since." He candidly adds, "I was always perfectly aware the Felix Leitner, the protagonist of The House of the Prophet, would be instantly related to Walter Lippmann, and I had no objection to this." Whether considered on its own merits or as a major statement on Lippmann, this volume deserves close scrutiny.

A "novel of power and hypocrisy in upper-class New York" that follows the rise of one prominent family, generation after generation ( The New Yorker). How did the families who live on Manhattan''s Upper East Side get to where they are today? This engaging saga by a New York Times–bestselling author charts the rise of an uncommon family in America''s grandest city. East Side Story tells of the Carnochan family whose Scottish forebears established themselves in New York''s textile business during the Civil War. From there they quickly moved on to seize prominent positions in the country''s top schools and Manhattan''s elite firms. As the novel unfolds, Carnochans across generations recount stories about their illuminating lives steeped in both good fortune and moral jeopardy. From women who outsmart their foolish husbands to ambitious lawyers who protect the Carnochan name to the family''s artists and writers, all weigh the question that infuses so much of Louis Auchincloss''s fiction: What makes for a meaningful life in a family that has so much? "Some writers inform, some instruct, and some tell how rewarding good prose can be," John Kenneth Galbraith once observed. "Louis Auchincloss does all three." In its starred review, Kirkus Reviews called East Side Story "a rich chronicle . . . that succeeds in humanizing a rare and much-maligned species of Americans for those who don''t come across them very much." Auchincloss''s superb novel is both a loving and wicked look at New York''s Yankee aristocracy as only this sublime master of manners can provide.

This New York Times–bestselling author’s story collection “displays consistent excellence in observing the spheres of art, law, money and society” (Publishers Weekly). Whether set in the world of Wall Street, the nineteenth-century Virginia aristocracy, or a boys’ school in New England, the short stories of Louis Auchincloss reveal a remarkable insight into the things that drive us and make us human. In this volume, the author collects a wide range of his finest work, taking us on a journey through decades of outstanding short fiction. “Spanning more than 40 years, this collection attests to Auchincloss’s durable talents: flawless prose, keen social observation, and a refined moral sensibility. The compromises between society and the individual, art and commerce, ego and restraint all figure into his finest fictions. Arranged chronologically, the 19 selections together suggest the author’s profound sense of American history, with all of its political and social eruptions. He seems to have emerged as a writer fully formed, since the earliest pieces here prove as supple and graceful as his most recent. . . . Auchincloss schools us in all the social differences we’re taught don’t exist. . . . Further proof, if any is needed, that Auchincloss ranks among the best in American literature.” —Kirkus Reviews

The author of False Gods and winner of the National Medal of Arts offers eight stories looking into the lives of the wealthy—but troubled—elite. Set in various decades throughout twentieth century, this entertaining short story collection reveals the inner lives of America’s upper classes in the polished, elegant prose that is Louis Auchincloss’s signature. The intricate balance of power in a marriage, the artist’s hunger for inspiration, the responsibilities of privileged youth on the eve of war—Auchincloss casts a knowing yet sympathetic eye on such dilemmas as they play themselves out in the salons, clubs, boarding schools, Park Avenue drawing rooms, and summer hideaways of the moneyed classes. In “The Man of Good Will,” an aging Seth Middletown finds himself unable to save a beloved grandson torn apart by the sixties — a boy carefully protected from a family secret. Dick and Joyce Emmons, in “The Lotos Eaters,” are surprised to find their new marriage subtly undermined by their own enchanted existence on a paradisal Florida island. A theatrical grande dame and an admiring young actor are “Priestess and Acolyte” —until they realize that the passions that rule them are irreconcilable. Evident on every page of the eight stories contained here are Auchincloss’s superb ear for dialogue and his ability to suggest what lies beneath the surface of human relationships. Tales of Yesteryear will give Auchincloss’s loyal readers cause to rejoice, and newcomers a delightful introduction to one of America''s most distinguished authors. Praise for Tales of Yesteryear “His word is as graceful and insightful as it’s ever been. These eight stories, with their familiar social types and elegant settings, are vintage Auchincloss: moral tales that resonate with the history of our times, albeit from the top down . . . . Auchincloss belongs among the masters of American short fiction, as this volume demonstrates.” —Kirkus Reviews “Auchincloss’s keen social observation, pitch-perfect dialogue and gift for dramatic confrontation are as effective as ever.” —Publishers Weekly

A cat may look at a king, says an old proverb. The king is the Sun King, Louis XIV of France, whose fabled court at Versailles was the wonder of Europe; the cat is the watchful chronicler, Louis de Rouvroy, second duc de Saint-Simon, author of the famous Memoirs which are the definitive record of Louis’ reign. Auchincloss has conceived his novel as an extension of the Memoirs, in which Saint-Simon reveals his own story—as well as a great deal about the private lives of the great and near-great that did not find its way into the published record. With his inimitable gift for characterization, Auchincloss portrays Saint-Simon, the meticulous, proud aristocrat of the old school who is at once fascinated and threatened by the powerful centralized monarchy Louis is building and by the king’s plot to bolster his position by marrying off his illegitimate children to princes of the blood. Elegant, crisp, and abounding in authentic detail, The Cat and the King shows us the factions, liaisons, intrigues and dalliances that made up daily life at Versailles as they might have been seen from Saint-Simon’s highly critical perspective. Auchincloss imagines the dominant figures of this greatest period in French history—the aging Louis; his pious morganatic spouse, Madame de Maintenon; Monsieur, the king’s homosexual brother; the great warrior and ladies’ man Conti; and many others—as wholly believable individuals with peculiar tics and foibles of their own; but none is stranger, more fascinating, or more believable than Saint-Simon himself. A remarkable portrait of a quintessential man of his time, a discerning study of the use and abuse of power, and an utterly convincing recreation of a turbulent age that bears no small resemblance to our own, The Cat and the King is a many-faceted jewel that represents a new dimension of achievement in Louis Auchincloss’ distinguished career as a novelist.

Short fiction examining the mysteries of human character, from a New York Times–bestselling author acclaimed as “among the best in American literature” (Kirkus Reviews). In the title story, a teacher at a private girls’ school ruminates on a long career, wondering if he was right to encourage his students to find a life less constrained than the conventional one prescribed to them—or if he cruelly raised unrealistic expectations. In “The Country Cousin,” a delightful one-act play, a wealthy woman’s dependent niece unwittingly serves as the vehicle that reveals her rich relatives’ self-involvement. Ranging from a boyhood friendship tested by the fabrications of the McCarthy era to an Episcopal priest tormented by an autocratic headmaster, Louis Auchincloss’s fiction illuminates the complications that ensue when our perceptions of other people’s natures—as well as our own—are upended. Praised by the Los Angeles Times as a writer “committed to examining the complicated layers of character, psychology, and society,” Louis Auchincloss presents a treasure trove of short fiction that showcases both his insight and his literary talent.

An “entertaining and occasionally even moving” personal recollection by the lawyer, historian, and renowned chronicler of old-money WASP society (The Boston Globe). At the time of his death, Louis Auchincloss—enemy of bores, self-pity, and stale gossip—had just finished taking on a subject he had long avoided: himself. His memoir confirms that, despite the spark of his fiction, Auchincloss himself was the most entertaining character he ever created. No traitor to his class, but occasionally its critic, Auchincloss returns to his insular society, which he maintains was less interesting than its members admitted—and unfurls his life with dignity, summoning family (particularly his father, who suffered from depression and forgave him for hating sports) and intimates. Brooke Astor and her circle are here, along with glimpses of Jacqueline Onassis. Most memorable, though, is Auchincloss’s way with those outside the salon: the cranky maid; the maiden aunt, perpetually out of place; the less-than-well-born boy who threw himself from a window over a woman and a man. Above all, here is what it was like to be Auchincloss, an American master, a New York Times–bestselling novelist, and a rare, generous, lively spirit to the end. “[Auchincloss] concentrates on bringing back to life—literary alchemy, after all—the people who loved him: his mother, father, aunts, uncles, school friends and colleagues. He understands how lucky he was to have them, and ‘A Voice From Old New York’ is his thank-you note.” —The New York Times

An insider''s look at a secretive world behind the closed doors of a prominent New York law firm. Through interwoven tales of family members, clients, and such notables as Teddy Roosevelt and the Astors, also an intimate portrait of a poignant friendship between two men.

In The Headmaster''s Dilemma, Louis Auchincloss revisits the prep school world of his most famous novel. That book, The Rector of Justin, published in 1964, took the form of a fictional biography, giving the reader the full life story of a much beloved and revered, if also feared, headmaster of an exclusive New England prep school. In The Headmaster''s Dilemma, we see up close what happens when a school''s ideals and founding principles collide with the exigencies of change. The Headmaster''s Dilemma is the story of Michael Sayre, the handsome, avant-garde headmaster of Averhill, the great New England prep school as he is faced with a school administrator''s worst nightmare: a lawsuit brought by fervent parents in response to an incident involving their son and an upperclassman. To make matters worse, Michael is losing support from both the board of trustees -- led by the conniving Donald Spencer -- and senior faculty members. With the help of his supportive wife, Michael attempts to right these wrongs, while keeping Averhill''s best interests in mind.

Short stories from a New York Times–bestselling author, in settings ranging from Edwardian garden parties to 1970s Manhattan. While bringing to life stories of the past filled with privilege and glamour, these tales also explore their characters’ less than savory ambitions and desires. In the title story, an older man eulogizes his young friend—a muse to the artists he gathered around himself—only to reveal that despite the young man’s burgeoning reputation as a poet, he could only inspire genius, but not produce it. The Young Apollo and Other Stories takes us inside upper-class lives, crystallizing a world now gone but forever fixed in our romantic imaginations, uncovering its flaws and all too human foibles, as well as its considerable charms. “This elegant . . . collection continues [Auchincloss’s] unflinching examination of New York’s wealthy socialite class.” —Library Journal “Auchincloss has a talent for pulling the curtain back on perfection, for peering behind the sublime facade.” —The Seattle Times

Two hundred years after his birth, Nathaniel Hawthorne remains one of America''s most important and influential writers. To celebrate that bicentennial, this new collection gathers essays by novelists, critics, historians, and biographers that explore aspects of Hawthorne''s life and work. It is published by the Lenox Library in Lenox, Massachusetts, the Berkshire town where Hawthorne spent two productive years and where he formed his friendship with Herman Melville. The writers and subjects here range from Louis Auchincloss and Elizabeth Hardwick on The Scarlet Letter to Paul Auster on Hawthorne''s journals and what they reveal about his family life; from Harrison Hayford''s previously unpublished exploration of Hawthorne''s influence on Melville to Carol Gilligan''s experiences adapting Hawthorne''s work for the stage; from Wendell Garrett''s evocation of nineteenth-century Salem to a sample of Hawthorne''s own journalism--"Chiefly About War Matters by a Peaceable Man," written for The Atlantic Monthly in 1862. Also in these essays, curators of Hawthorne historical sites explore the influence of physical environment on the writer; biographer Brenda Wineapple examines the author''s political views, including his controversial disdain of abolitionists; journalist and novelist Tom Wicker offers an appraisal of Hawthorne''s skills as a war correspondent; and journalist Neil Hickey considers the author''s ongoing cultural influence through film and television adaptations of his work. The heavily illustrated volume will also feature a range of visual materials, including original, full-page silhouettes in a nineteenth century style by Scherenschnitte (papercutting) artist Pamela Dalton.

In 1953, the wealthy coastal enclave of Glenville is shaken by scandal when it is revealed that Rodman Jessup, junior partner of a prestigious law firm, has become embroiled in an adulterous affair with a society woman.

From one of America''s greatest men of letters, our sublime master of manners, comes his novel, Her Infinite Variety. Louis Auchincloss has been called "our most astute observer of moral paradox among the affluent" (Arthur Schlesinger, Jr.), and his fiction described as that which "has always examined what makes life worth living" (Washington Post Book World). Now he brings us the rollicking tale of an unforgettable woman of mid-twentieth century America: the devilish, forever plotting, yet wholly beguiling Clara Hoyt. A romantic early in life, Clara gets engaged--much to her mother''s horror--to the lackluster Bobbie Lester. Soon after her Vassar graduation, however, Clara sees the error of her ways, spurns Bobbie, and slyly enthralls the well-bred and fabulously wealthy Trevor Hoyt, the first of her husbands. Soon she lands a job at a tony magazine, and so begins her wildly entertaining course to the inner sanctum of New York''s aristocracy and into the boardrooms of the publishing world. In a world where women still had to wield the weapons of allure and charm, above all else, to secure positions of power, Clara, one of the last of her kind, succeeds marvelously. Auchincloss gives us, in Clara, an irresistible Cleopatra, lovely, wily, and mercurial. As Shakespeare wrote of that feminine creation, "Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale / Her infinite variety."

From a New York Times–bestselling author, short stories of the privileged class, spanning a century of New York history:“Urbane, humorous . . . a treat to read.” —Library Journal Sublime master of manners, exquisite critic of the upper crust, and beloved American author Louis Auchincloss is at his wry, brilliant best with this collection of ten short stories about New York aristocracy. Drawing on a century of Manhattan high society, Auchincloss weaves a set of perfectly crafted, intimate portrayals of the struggles and dramas of the elite. From a woman faced with choosing love or prestige when marrying to a man torn between loyalty to his family and country when called to war to a matchmaker handling a rogue romance, these glamorous yet all-too-human tales present a remarkable tableau of the American upper class. A series of “finely etched portraits of the kind of men we’ve become used to meeting in [Auchincloss’s] fiction,” Manhattan Monologues stands as a remarkable achievement of short fiction, a legend of American letters at his insightful best (The New York Times Book Review). “For the sheer elegance of his prose, Louis Auchincloss deserves a large and enthusiastic following.” —The Baltimore Sun

The American century opened with the election of that quintessentially American adventurer, Theodore Roosevelt. Louis Auchincloss''s warm and knowing biography introduces us to the man behind the many myths in this edition of The American Presidents Series. Copyright © Libri GmbH. All rights reserved.

From a New York Times–bestselling author: A collection of short fiction “reminiscent of the work of Henry James and Edith Wharton” (Library Journal). Crisscrossing a tumultuous century, these stories evoke lives both blessed and cursed by good fortune and reveal the quotidian conflicts of a wonderfully rich milieu. Here are vignettes that capture the loves and jealousies of marriage and friendship, recall days of a rarefied aristocracy, and hint at a new, ambitious young elite. In the title story, a tour de force of humor and emotion, a clergyman prepares a toast for his twenty-fifth wedding anniversary but gets stuck when it comes to his wife’s five-year affair. The narrator in “DeCicco v. Schweizer” imagines the lives of the plaintiff and defendant and spins a wicked tale about a 1902 marriage born more of convenience than of love. And in “The Last of the Great Courtesans,” we meet the unforgettable Milly Marion, born in 1917, who has bewitched everyone she has met in her long, colorful life. Whether these stories concern an anxious draft dodger, a repentant headmaster, or a mischievous writer who ill-advisedly draws from her own family for her fiction, they all offer soulful glimpses into an uncommon world, preserved in our past and yet surprisingly close to our hearts. “His themes are universal—ambition, greed, disappointment, compromise. Some of the most memorable characters are women, trying to find their way in a time of more restricted choices . . . It’s easy to get lost in the author’s elegant and restrained prose.” —Booklist

With its ranks limited to 250 members, the American Academy of Arts and Letters is counted among the foremost honors an American in the arts can receive. For this tribute to the Academy, eleven of its current members provide illuminating insights into those artists whom members have held in high esteem--and those they have not. 85 photos.

A collection of stories about rich Wasps. In Ars Gratia Artis, a railroad baron becomes a patron of the arts in a bid to atone for a life of money grabbing, while in Geraldine, a woman chooses dignity over money.

"Three Lives, more radically than any other work of the time* in English, brought the language back to life. Not the life of the peasantry or the emotions or the proletariat but life as it was lived by everybody living in the century, the average or normal life as the naturalists had seen it. Gertrude Stein in this work tried to coordinate the composition of the language with the process of consciousness, which . . . was to her a close reflex of the total living personality. . . . "Gertrude Stein uses the simplest possible words, the common words used by everybody, and a version of the most popular phrasing, to express the most complicated thing. . . . [ She] uses repetition and dislocation to make the word bear all the meaning it has . . . one has to give her work word by word the deliberate attention one gives to something written in italics." —DONALD SUTHERLAND, in Gertrude Stein: A Biography oj Her Work

Six stories blending ancient Greek mythology with modern, upper-class Manhattan, from the author of Skinny Island. Louis Auchincloss once again evokes the beguiling world of New York society that he has made his own special literary landscape. Inspired by the colorful mosaic of ancient Greek myths, he has created six equally rich contemporary fables—six lives governed by false gods. Hermes, or in Auchincloss’s interpretation, “god of the self-made man,” is a Jewish lawyer who finds acceptance into WASP society only at greatest personal cost; Hephaestus is a bachelor designer of Palladian villas whose young bride, enamored of newfangled things, compels him to “go modern.” In other stories, a former World War II naval officer, guided perhaps by the goddess Athene, escapes a sinking cruise ship by disguising himself as a woman; and a Catholic convert, distracted by the muse Polyhymnia, is torn between his priestly duties and his worldly social and artistic ambitions. In every tale a unique moral sensibility holds sway, revealing how the pagan impulse may surface in the most unlikely and provocative situations, compromising even the noblest of spirits. Keenly insightful, flawlessly executed, False Gods is the work of a National Medal of Arts winner, widely acclaimed as American society’s most entertaining and intelligent critic. Praise for False Gods “These modern-day tales subtly describe the effects of moral conflict and compromised values . . . . These fables are finely crafted and eloquently written.” —Library Journal

The author of The Vanderbilt Era examines sixteen famous friendships, from Boswell and Johnson to Hawthorne and Melville. This delightful series of short essays explores friendship in its various forms—from true intimacy to professional detente between rivals. The friendships, literary and political, span two continents and three centuries—Boswell and Johnson, Fitzgerald and Hemingway, Richelieu and Father Joseph, FDR and Harry Hopkins, Edith Wharton and Margaret Chanler—sixteen sketches in all. Auchincloss approaches his subjects with grace, tact, and insight, subtly defining the peculiar, gentle chemistry on which platonic bonds depend. The result is a surprising array of social patterns and personal destinies, all stemming from the simple desire for human company.

A history of the growth of the J.P. Morgan collections and an examination of the quality of Morgan''s eye and the impulses behind his purchases. More than 130 illustrations present a survey of Morgan''s treasures, which include the Fragonard panels and Vermeer''s A lady writing.

The New York Times–bestselling author “picks up where Wharton and James left off, with [a] stylish, tasteful novel of manners” (Publishers Weekly). Natica Chauncey, the daughter of a financier ruined by the Great Depression, is determined to regain the social status she has lost. She relies on a kindly matron for her glancing acquaintance with the aristocracy of Long Island—but she is haunted by a yearning for more. Coming of age at a time when anything more than a modest show of ambition does not become a lady, she must seek her own fortune in the fortunes of others. And so, with little more than her wits and determination, she makes her way through the social shoals of New England prep schools, Hudson Valley estates, and New York drawing rooms. Natica has a gift for finding opportunity in improbable situations, even at the risk of scandal—and almost in spite of herself, she will emerge as an unlikely, and unforgettable, femme fatale.

In these captivating profiles of the first four generations of railroad tycoon "Commodore" Cornelius Vanderbilt''s family, veteran novelist Louis Auchincloss weaves a tale of wealth in pursuit of grandeur. For the Vanderbilts, living well was the ultimate revenge. 25 photos.

A young Manhattan art museum curator goes to questionable lengths to garner success in this dramatic novel by the author of Diary of a Yuppie. In a world of opulent museums, lavish homes, and extravagant dreams, public spectacle pales before private intrigue, and the pursuit of power is the finest art. Welcome to the world of master storyteller Louis Auchincloss. “In a small but distinguished museum on Central Park West, battle lines are arranged, pitting a brash young curator, imbued with a craving for personal grandeur and a lust for the directorship of the museum, against colleagues whose main concern is the integrity of the collections they guard . . . . Auchincloss . . . is a deft guide through a closed-in world.” —Publishers Weekly

Twelve stories contemplating destiny and detailing the life of Manhattan’s upper class over the course of one hundred years, from the author of Honorable Men. It’s only twelve miles long and two miles wide, but it has more money for its area, more history packed into its relatively brief settlement, and more emotional and intellectual energy coursing through its streets than any other place on earth. Manhattan is the setting for all of Louis Auchincloss’s fiction, and it is the stage on which those New Yorkers whose roots go down to its bedrock play out the drama of their lives. From the turn of the century to our present urban follies, these stories follow the fortunes of the socially secure and powerful as they try to cope with the changes shaped by the momentous events and growing anxieties of recent decades. Taken together, the tales weave a larger pattern of human strengths and foibles that bemuses the mind and touches the heart. The elegant prose, crystalline dialogue, immense insight into the mores, preoccupations, and afflictions of the rich, and the connoisseur’s sense of both art and life that are characteristic of Auchincloss—all are here, but with a depth of passion and irony exceeding anything he has accomplished in the past. Praise for Skinny Island “Many of Auchincloss’ wealthy and Waspy protagonists, caught in such fine conflict, find it difficult to defend their dwindling kind or, conversely, to rebel against their confining values . . . . With this, his 40th book, Auchincloss has yet to exhaust his art, or his loyal readers.” —Kirkuks Reviews

In this novel by the author of Honorable Men, a hot-shot corporate lawyer will sacrifice anything for success in 1980s Manhattan. Bob Service is a thirty-two-year-old crack lawyer with blood as cold and clear as a five-dollar martini. His god is power, and his morals are ever tempered by expediency. His goals far exceed an imminent partnership in a big New York law firm. Bob’s “perfect” marriage to Alice, a graceful and intelligent literary agent, is no match for the ardor of his corporate drive. And it certainly pales beside his explosive affair with Sylvia, whose naked ambition matches his own and whose social connections provide the ultimate bridge to the pinnacles of success. How Bob marches toward his fate while trampling on his associates and crippling his marriage forms the plot of this fast-paced novel about 1980s mores and life on the fast track of the big law firms. Office intrigue and duels for power rival anything that Machiavelli could have conjured up. And it all has an unnervingly authentic ring... Praise for Diary of a Yuppie “Absorbing and fun . . . It is refreshing to find characters who are willing to discuss the spiritual dimensions of their business decisions, the ethics of their trade.” —New York Times “Because greed and glory aren’t exclusive to Wall St.—Auchincloss turf—this most moral of fictions deserves a wide audience.” —Kirkus Reviews “This brief contemporary novel explores the ethics of loyalty in business, love, and friendship. Auchincloss, a prolific novelist of manners, is also a Wall Street attorney, and his shallow, ambitious characters ring true . . . [A] subtle, memorable book.” —Library Journal