EBOOK
About
A powerful and compassionate debut novel about friendship and how it helps shape us into the people we are
The Intimates is a brilliant and deeply moving first novel about the varieties of romance. Spanning years and continents, beginnings and endings, it is about two gifted and striving people who discover themselves in the reflection they see in each other, and how their affinity anchors them at critical points in their lives.
Maize and Robbie are drawn to each other from the first time they meet in high school. When it becomes obvious that their relationship won't be sexual, they establish a different kind of intimacy: becoming each other's "human diaries." Their passionate Friendship plays out against a backdrop of charged connections: with lovers and would be lovers, family members, teachers, and bosses. For the better part of a decade they're inseparable fellow travelers, but ultimately they must confront the underside of the extreme and complicated closeness that has sustained them since they were teenagers.
Full of indelible characters, engrossing situations, and observations as sharply witty as they are lovely and profound, The Intimates renders the wonders and disappointments of becoming an adult, the thrills and mesmerizing illusions of sex, and the secrets we keep from others and ourselves as we struggle to locate our true character. The Intimates marks the emergence of a remarkable new voice.
The Intimates is a brilliant and deeply moving first novel about the varieties of romance. Spanning years and continents, beginnings and endings, it is about two gifted and striving people who discover themselves in the reflection they see in each other, and how their affinity anchors them at critical points in their lives.
Maize and Robbie are drawn to each other from the first time they meet in high school. When it becomes obvious that their relationship won't be sexual, they establish a different kind of intimacy: becoming each other's "human diaries." Their passionate Friendship plays out against a backdrop of charged connections: with lovers and would be lovers, family members, teachers, and bosses. For the better part of a decade they're inseparable fellow travelers, but ultimately they must confront the underside of the extreme and complicated closeness that has sustained them since they were teenagers.
Full of indelible characters, engrossing situations, and observations as sharply witty as they are lovely and profound, The Intimates renders the wonders and disappointments of becoming an adult, the thrills and mesmerizing illusions of sex, and the secrets we keep from others and ourselves as we struggle to locate our true character. The Intimates marks the emergence of a remarkable new voice.
Related Subjects
Reviews
"Ralph Sassone has created two of the most compelling characters in years . . . Often funny, The Intimates is a touching platonic love story from beginning to end."
John Moore, Examiner.com
"The emotional insight of Ralph Sassone's The Intimates puts one in mind of Claire Messud, Joanna Smith Rakoff or Julia Glass, novelists who trace the evolution of friendships among smart New York types, gay and straight . . . A large supporting cast is fully imagined . . . Even those who appear for a few pages, like Maize's stepfather, come right off the page."
Marion Winik, Newsday
"Examining the notion that lovers come and go but friendships last a lifetime, Ralph Sassone's debut novel . . . delves into the rarely-explored literary topic of adult heterosexual relationships uncomplicated by sexual tension . . . Sassone deftly cuts to the core of a quarter-life crisis mindset . . . It's hard to imagine any adult reader (particularly among recent college graduates) who wouldn't identify with at least some aspects of the characters' personalities . . . The Intimates is actually about the idea of families, the ones we're born into and the ones we choose for ourselves."
Liz Raftery, The Boston Globe