In the Middle Distance: A Novel

251 pp. "A fictive autobiography, this novel tells the story of a middle-aged architect named Nicholas Delbanco. At a time of crisis in his life, he retires alone to this farm in Cossayuna New York, there to try to draw his past back into himself - to see his life backwards an so put together its pieces: childhood, education, first love, and later mistresses, marriage, careers, the death of a child... Nicholas will also write a novel in the form of a journal - 'as an act of explication and an act of penance.' "