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Rules for Saying Goodbye
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Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
Katherine Taylor's debut features a narrator named Katherine Taylor, whose rebellious mother sends her from Fresno to Manhattan's fictional Claver prep at age 13. The madcap, fast-forward shenanigans that follow read like Auntie Mame à la A.M. Homes. Rich Claver friend Page gets pregnant and develops a coke habit. Katherine gets a Columbia M.F.A. but lacks drive, tending bar at an exclusive hotspot while trying not to deal with her abrasive mom. Katherine's brother, Ethan, a gay actor, rooms with her in her cheap uptown digs until he becomes "the face of Diet Coke." There's ambivalent romance that involves a move to London. Claver friend Clarissa gets cancer as she turns 30. When a nutty neighbor threatens to kill Katherine, police advise vacating, but "giving up a rent-controlled apartment to save your life is as ridiculous as living in Queens." While a lot of what Katherine does is familiar, Taylor is a superb satirist, eviscerating everyone in her Katherine's path. In the middle of the novel she drops a list of "rules for saying goodbye"; it's extraneous, even precious, and it's the best thing in the book: e.g., "Once you are gone, be gone for good." Taylor manages to make worn New York yarns feel fresh again. (June)
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Review
Katherine Taylor's debut features a narrator named Katherine Taylor, whose rebellious mother sends her from Fresno to Manhattan's fictional Claver prep at age 13. The madcap, fast-forward shenanigans that follow read like Auntie Mame à la A.M. Homes. Rich Claver friend Page gets pregnant and develops a coke habit. Katherine gets a Columbia M.F.A. but lacks drive, tending bar at an exclusive hotspot while trying not to deal with her abrasive mom. Katherine's brother, Ethan, a gay actor, rooms with her in her cheap uptown digs until he becomes "the face of Diet Coke." There's ambivalent romance that involves a move to London. Claver friend Clarissa gets cancer as she turns 30. When a nutty neighbor threatens to kill Katherine, police advise vacating, but "giving up a rent-controlled apartment to save your life is as ridiculous as living in Queens." While a lot of what Katherine does is familiar, Taylor is a superb satirist, eviscerating everyone in her Katherine's path. In the middle of the novel she drops a list of "rules for saying goodbye"; it's extraneous, even precious, and it's the best thing in the book: e.g., "Once you are gone, be gone for good." Taylor manages to make worn New York yarns feel fresh again. (June)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
Review
"Katherine Taylor's debut novel is sensational. It's wry, funny, heartfelt, and written with grace. I thought boys had the patent on cruelty, but wow, girls can be rough on each other! And yet it's a testament to Taylor's talent that this novel never loses sight of the complexity, the humanity, at the heart of these characters. The story isn't always pretty, but it's so damn good." -- Victor LaValle, author of The Ecstatic and Slapboxing with Jesus
"Reading Katherine Taylor is like meeting at a party full of strangers the person you instantly recognize will be a friend for life. Confiding, gossipy, and heartfelt, Rules for Saying Goodbye charts the inexplicable failings and the surprising durabilities of love. It is a sparkling and witty debut."
-- Elisabeth Robinson, author of the New York Times bestseller The True and Amazing Adventures of the Hunt Sisters
"This story tumbles through years of a life, careening through cities, through decadent days and nights, through ranks of soulful and magnetic characters. Taylor can wink like Dorothy Parker, and move through worlds like Christopher Isherwood. After you read the last page, your shirt-cuffs will be stained with wine and perfumed with cigarette smoke, and you will be giddy and exhausted from this long, tender, bittersweet, intimate, lovely party." -- Jardine Libaire, author of Here Kitty Kitty
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"This story tumbles through years of a life, careening through cities, through decadent days and nights, through ranks of soulful and magnetic characters. Taylor can wink like Dorothy Parker, and move through worlds like Christopher Isherwood. After you read the last page, your shirt-cuffs will be stained with wine and perfumed with cigarette smoke, and you will be giddy and exhausted from this long, tender, bittersweet, intimate, lovely party." -- Jardine Libaire, author of Here Kitty Kitty
"For a fleeting and innocent period in a certain kind of girl's life, cocktails and cigarettes are just an excuse to talk to each other. Rules for Saying Goodbye elegantly describes how this equation reverses--the talking becomes the excuse for the cocktails and cigarettes. In her smart and funny novel, Katherine Taylor renders with unusual precision both the wistfulness and the wit in female friendships." — Dana Spiotta, National Book Award-nominated author of Eat the Document
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“Achieves a directness and intimacy few novels can match. A beautifully observed and poignant book.” —T.C. Boyle
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Inside This Book
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First Sentence:
I knew how to listen in on the telephone extension without anyone hearing a click. Read the first page Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
nice breasts Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
New York, Los Angeles, Auntie Petra, Lucas Peabody, Aunt Lou, Harbor Springs, Stefano Naldi, Westy Adams, Gwyneth Paltrow, Jim Mullins, San Francisco, United States, Marco Fubini, Second Avenue, Seventy-fifth Street, Central Park, Diet Coke, Elizabeth Taylor, Hotel Russie, Mount Rushmore, Park Avenue, Starlight Express, The Trash Man, Upper East Side, Albert Savage New!
Concordance | Text Stats Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Front Flap | First Pages | Back Flap | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
I knew how to listen in on the telephone extension without anyone hearing a click. Read the first page Key Phrases - Statistically Improbable Phrases (SIPs): (learn more)
nice breasts Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
New York, Los Angeles, Auntie Petra, Lucas Peabody, Aunt Lou, Harbor Springs, Stefano Naldi, Westy Adams, Gwyneth Paltrow, Jim Mullins, San Francisco, United States, Marco Fubini, Second Avenue, Seventy-fifth Street, Central Park, Diet Coke, Elizabeth Taylor, Hotel Russie, Mount Rushmore, Park Avenue, Starlight Express, The Trash Man, Upper East Side, Albert Savage New!
Concordance | Text Stats Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Front Flap | First Pages | Back Flap | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
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