Amazon Best Books of the Month, January 2011: In his first book for adults, popular young-adult novelist David Levithan creates a beautifully crafted exploration of the insecurities, tenderness, anger, and contented comfort that make romantic relationships so compelling (or devastating). Through sparingly written, alphabetical entries that defy chronology in defining a love affair, The Lover’s Dictionary packs an emotional wallop. For "breathtaking (adj.)," the unnamed narrator explains, "Those moments when we kiss and surrender for an hour before we say a single word." For "exacerbate (v.)," he notes, "I believe your exact words were: 'You’re getting too emotional.'" Ranging from over a page to as short as "celibacy (n.), n/a," the definitions-as-storyline alternate between heart-wrenching and humorous--certainly an achievement for a book structured more like Webster’s than a traditional novel. Proving that enduring characters and conflict trump word count, Levithan’s poignant vignettes and emotional candor will remind readers that sometimes in both fiction and life, less is truly more--and the personal details of love can be remarkably universal. --Jessica Schein Amazon Exclusive: A Q&A with David Levithan
Q: What inspired you to write The Lover’s Dictionary?
Levithan: Every year for the past 23 years, I’ve written a story for my friends for Valentine’s Day. It started when I was a junior in high school and remarkably bored in my physics class--I decided to go through the physics book and find all the romantic references I could (opposites attracting, magnetism, etc), and turn it into a love story. My friends liked it, and the next year, they demanded a new story for Valentine’s Day. A tradition (or, at least, a deadline) was born.
Two years ago, I hit February 1st and I hadn’t started writing my Valentine’s Day story. I had a few ideas, but none were kicking in. I sat down at my desk to thing something up, and right by an elbow was a book I’d recently recovered from my parents’ basement--a book of “words you need to know” that I’d been given as a gift (probably for my high school graduation). I thought it might be interesting to take random words from that book, in alphabetical order, and tell the story of a relationship through those words, in dictionary form. I didn’t plan any of it out--I let the words tell the story. And two weeks later, I had the story version of The Lover’s Dictionary.
Q: How (if at all) was the experience of writing what is classified as an adult novel different from writing a young adult novel? Did you approach the emotion of love differently?
Levithan: I didn’t approach this book any differently from my other books. Because, really, the emotions don’t change. Perspective changes (a little, sometimes not even a little), but the emotions are still there. Yes, the twenty-something characters in The Lover’s Dictionary are facing some issues most teens don’t face--moving in together, paying rent. But most of what they’re feeling is merely a continuation of the emotions that come to the fore when you’re a teenager--wanting to belong, wanting to understand yourself, wanting to understand the person you love, wanting to know what love is. I’d love to say that when we become adults we stop being insecure, that we have answers, that we know the right words for the right moments. But that’s simply not true.
Q: Were there any words/definitions that didn’t make it in to the final book?
Levithan: Not that many. I just went back to the first draft and found one:
haggle, v. There was no way I was letting the Atlanta Braves lamp to our apartment, and you said, fine, then my lunchbox collection could go back to my parents’ basement, where it belonged.
I’m not even sure why it didn’t make the cut. Maybe there were already too many entries about decorating the apartment.
Q: The Lover’s Dictionary isn’t a linear story and is organized alphabetically, much like a traditional reference dictionary. How (if at all) did you change your writing process knowing that it would unfold this way?
Levithan: I loved writing in a nonlinear way. Because it feels to me like a more accurate way of how we recount relationships. They never come back to us as a narrative, told beginning-middle-end. Whether it’s over or ongoing, we remember it in flashes. Different moments from the past hit us at different moments in the present. So when the narrator sits down to recount the relationship to the lover, it makes sense to me that the relationship would appear to him in this way, with the words as the catalyst for the memories, and the memories adding up to the truth.
Q: Why did you decide to write the novel in first person, directed at a second person?
Levithan: The act of writing the book (for the narrator) is as much a part of the story as the story itself. I don’t want to explain the book too much, so I can leave it at that. And I wanted it to play like a love song you hear on the radio--the most effective love songs are somehow both specific and universal. You feel you are hearing someone else’s story, but at the same time you relate to it so much that their story doesn’t preclude your story. I wanted The Lover’s Dictionary to be like that.
Q: Describe how you feel about writing in three words.
Levithan: Wonderment. Curiosity. Random.
*Starred Review* Levithan, a popular YA author and an editorial director at Scholastic, has had the inspired idea of writing the story of a love relationship in the form of a dictionary. Each word, from aberrant to zenith, defines the language of love, while adding to the reader’s knowledge and understanding of the male lovers’ partnership. Interestingly, each definition is told from the point of view and in the first-person voice of only one of the partners. The other partner’s voice remains silent throughout except as quoted by the narrator. Nevertheless, both come wonderfully alive, emerging as complex, multidimensional human beings, happy and unhappy, ebullient and angry, sweet and sour, and so—delightfully—forth. Happily, the order of the alphabet does not dictate the order of the story, which moves backward and forward in time. Thus, the dramatic necessity of conflict arises from one partner’s infidelity, the impact of which is then explored at various points in the history of the partnership. Nothing is cut-and-dried, however, for as Levithan demonstrates, intimacy is sometimes enigmatic and, as he notes under ineffable, “No matter how many words there are, there will never be enough.” So you must clearly pick and choose which to use, an act that Levithan has accomplished artfully and satisfyingly. --Michael Cart
Review
“Levithan brings ingenuity and a wry edge to his first adult novel. . . Among the novel's pleasures are micro-stories that speak volumes, reminiscent of Lydia Davis' work. . . There's plenty of reflection, not just on the relationship but on the attempt to distill and describe such complex feeling, including this: ‘Trying to write about love is ultimately like trying to have a dictionary represent life. No matter how many words there are, there will never be enough.' That, by the way, is Levithan's definition of ineffable.” ―Heller McAlpin, NPR.org
“‘The Lover's Dictionary' is clever and poetic and, sigh, sad. . . The brief entries are like poetry; poetry with a gravitational pull back to the central narrative, which is two people falling in love. The fact that the pieces hold together so well is testament, not only to Levithan's light hand and gracious writing but also to the power of this universal story.” ―Susan Salter Reynolds, Newsday
“Young-adult novelist David Levithan doesn't list this entry under the V in the alphabetically headed (and arranged) chapters of ‘The Lover's Dictionary,' his charming short novel about a love affair and its bittersweet evolution from first flirt to shaky domesticity, for lovers of all gender persuasions . . . Surrounded by large amounts of white space--which may be useful for readers as we walk through these dictionary-like entries for musing on our own loves and losses--the spare number of words in Levithan's novel may be just enough . . . But allow me to exclaim. Without ellipsis. (and some white space) Here is a lovely Valentine's Day gift for lovers!” ―Alan Cheuse, San Francisco Chronicle
“Levithan crafts a love affair as sharp, funny, and sad as any you'd find in an epic novel. . . The Lover's Dictionary isn't about how lessons were learned, and in what order--it's a documentation of facts, memories, war wounds. And anyone who has been in a romantic relationship will recognize themselves in Levithan's lovers, from the tiniest details of merging bookshelves and quiet afternoons to the largest anxieties of sexual inadequacy and romantic reciprocity. Levithan's rhapsody is just that: an ode to desire written as an account of the traces such desire leaves behind.” ―Jessica Freeman-Slade, TheRumpus.net
“David Levithan makes every word count . . . Levithan gives readers the kind of love story that Billy Pilgrim in ‘Slaughterhouse-Five' would have appreciated: unstuck in time, reliving moments in unpredictable order and in varying emotional colors. . . an equal opportunity romance with wit and rue, kisses and tears, that anyone can enjoy.” ―Jim Higgins, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
“From ‘aberrant' to ‘zenith,' David Levithan's latest creates a relationship in short scenes, packed with lyrical language. Entries slip back and forth in time as they unfold through an alphabet of romance, anger, forgiveness and tenderness to make up one particular relationship . . . The entries manage to be both intently focused and hinting at the larger picture. They read more like a well-crafted series of poems than a linear story line. Each word is defined and captured in a moment of the relationship. Levithan moves from romance to heartbreak to flirtation to devotion, in alphabetical order.” ―Elizabeth Willse, Star-Ledger
“Interestingly, each definition is told from the point of view and in the first-person voice of only one of the partners. The other partner's voice remains silent throughout except as quoted by the narrator. Nevertheless, both come wonderfully alive, emerging as complex, multidimensional human beings, happy and unhappy, ebullient and angry, sweet and sour, and so--delightfully--forth. Happily, the order of the alphabet does not dictate the order of the story, which moves backward and forward in time. Thus, the dramatic necessity of conflict arises from one partner's infidelity, the impact of which is then explored at various points in the history of the partnership. Nothing is cut-and-dried, however, for as Levithan demonstrates, intimacy is sometimes enigmatic and, as he notes under ineffable, "No matter how many words there are, there will never be enough." So you must clearly pick and choose which to use, an act that Levithan has accomplished artfully and satisfyingly.” ―Booklist (starred review)
“Levithan attains some heartbreaking moments as well as pitches of hilarity with his concise, polished writing. Inherent in such an endeavor is an adorableness thankfully grounded by Levithan's wit.” ―Publishers Weekly
About the Author
David Levithan is the author of many acclaimed young-adult novels, including the New York Times bestselling Nick & Norah's Infinite Playlist (with Rachel Cohn), which was adapted into a popular movie. He is also an editorial director at Scholastic.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
THE LOVER'S DICTIONARY
By David LevithanFarrar, Straus and Giroux, LLC
Copyright © 2011 David Levithan
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-374-19368-3
Chapter One
I, n. Me without anyone else.
idea, n.
"I'm quitting," you say. "I can't believe how wasted I was.
This time, I'm really going to do it."
And I tell you I'll help. It's almost a script at this point.
imperceptible, adj.
We stopped counting our relationship in dates (first date, second date, fifth date, seventh) and started counting it in months. That might have been the first true commitment, this shift in terminology. We never talked about it, but we were at a party and someone asked how long we'd been together, and when you said, "A month and a half," I knew we had gotten there.
impromptu, adj.
I have summer Fridays off; you don't. So what better reason for me to take you to lunch and then keep you at lunch for the whole afternoon? Reserving these afternoons to do all the city things we never get around to doing — wandering through MoMA, stopping in at the Hayden Planetarium, hopping onto the Staten Island Ferry and riding back and forth, back and forth, watching all the people as they unknowingly parade for us. You notice clothes more than I do, so it's a pleasure to hear your running commentary, to construct lives out of worn handbags or shirts opened one button too low. Had we tried to plan these excursions, they never would have worked. There has to be that feeling of escape.
inadvertent, adj.
You left your email open on my computer. I couldn't help it — I didn't open any of them, but I did look at who they were from, and was relieved.
incessant, adj.
The doubts. You had to save me from my constant doubts. That deep-seeded feeling that I wasn't good enough for anything — I was a fake at my job, I wasn't your equal, my friends would forget me if I moved away for a month. It wasn't as easy as hearing voices — nobody was telling me this. It was just something I knew. Everyone else was playing along, but I was sure that one day they would all stop.
indelible, adj.
That first night, you took your finger and pointed to the top of my head, then traced a line between my eyes, down my nose, over my lips, down my neck, to the center of my chest. It was so surprising, I knew I would never mimic it. That one gesture would be yours forever.
ineffable, adj.
These words will ultimately end up being the barest of reflections, devoid of the sensations words cannot convey. Trying to write about love is ultimately like trying to have a dictionary represent life. No matter how many words there are, there will never be enough.
infidel, n.
We think of them as hiding in the hills — rebels, ransackers, rogue revolutionaries. But really, aren't they just guilty of infidelity?
innate, adj.
"Why do you always make the bed?" I asked. "We're only going to get back in it later tonight."
You looked at me like I was the worst kind of slacker.
"It's just what I've always done," you said. "We always had to make our bed. Always."
integral, adj.
I was so nervous to meet Kathryn. You'd made it clear she was the only friend whose opinion you really cared about, so I spent more time getting dressed for her than I ever had for you. We met at that sushi place on Seventh Avenue and I awkwardly shook her hand, then told her I'd heard so much about her, which came off like me trying to legitimize your friendship, when I was the one who needed to get the stamp of approval. I was on safer ground once we started talking about books, and she seemed impressed that I actually read them. She remarked on the steadiness of my job, the steadiness of my family. I wasn't sure I wanted to be steady, but she saw my unease and assured me it was a good thing, not usually your type. We found out we'd gone to summer camp within ten minutes of each other, and that sealed it. You were lost in our tales of the Berkshires and the long, unappreciative stretches we'd spent on the Tanglewood lawn.
At the end of the dinner, I got a hug, not a handshake. She seemed so relieved. I should have been glad ... but it only made me wonder about the other guys of yours that she'd met. I wondered why I was considered such a break from the norm.
"Excerpted from THE LOVER'S DICTIONARY by David Levithan, to be published in January 2011 by Farrar, Straus and Giroux, LLC. Copyright © 2011 by David Levithan. All rights reserved."
(Continues...)
Excerpted from THE LOVER'S DICTIONARY by David Levithan Copyright © 2011 by David Levithan. Excerpted by permission of Farrar, Straus and Giroux, LLC. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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