Unprofessionals

By Julie Hecht

Book Overview

There is no American writer alive who is funnier, more inquisitive, or more surprising than Julie Hecht. The Unprofessionals, her first novel, whose narrator also told the stories in the author's bestselling collection Do the Windows Open?, is a triumph of tragicomedy. The book follows the odd friendship between the narrator -- a photographer in her late forties -- and a precocious raconteur, identified only as The Boy, whom she has known since his childhood. As the narrator and the young man regale each other with tales of the way Americans live now, she is also telling the story of his path to heroin addiction and his many attempts to recover.

The Unprofessionals is a masterpiece of comic despair, illuminating our bewildering century, and a hilarious and sad story of two outsiders who see the world with painful clarity -- and as a whole, a novel of unexampled originality.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1416564276
• ISBN13: 9781416564270
• Release Date: August 2008
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster
• Length: 240 Pages
• Weight: 0.55 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 6.3" x 8.4"

Customer Reviews

Builds on "windows" stories

I thought this book built on the Do the WIndows Open Stories very well. The Dr. Loquesto stories were not my favorites - I really only got this book because I wanted SOMETHING new of Hecht's. But I thought the book went far beyond the stories. The tragedy of the boy's story, her outsider status and her own fanciful version of who the boy was, and all the things she couldn't know about the boy because she only knew what he told her made this book more profound and less intentionally frivolous than the stories. It's ineresting ot read a novel written by someone I know for her stories. The book had the same breezy feel, but it IS a novel with a longer story line that is very well-sustained and with much more detail.

Struggles

I have to admit, this book grabs you. You're thrown into this 49 year olds battles with herself and those around her. The plot development was slow, but only being 14 myself, it was a satisfying read. Her struggles are expressed through a series of events throughout her relationship with this "boy" which tests her sanity as she matures into middle age.

Perfect Second Act

The Unprofessionals is a perfect second act to Hecht's collection of short stories, "Do the Windows Open?" She paints her characters with a very fine brush and her language is equally immaculate: there is never a word out of place or a vulgar shortcut when it comes to portraying emotion. Hecht is a consummate professional when it comes to writing. Anyone who winces when they read something badly written should treat themselves to both books.I look forward to re-reading this novel and reading what ever will come next.

Julie Hecht is brilliant.

This is a hilarious, harrowing, immensely moving novel from an essential writer. I highly recommend it.