Norton Mackay

The Admirers Norton Mackay

Publisher Marketing: Set in northern Alabama and Georgia, these six interwoven stories follow the lives of several young men who dwell on the lost women they still love, while attempting to find meaning in the present. Their memories overlap as the stories progress, until the protagonists become more and more similar and their tales form a single narrative of loss and reinvention. The collection begins with the embittered but humorous first-person account of Roger, a once promising pianist, and Taylor, a high school friend moved North. We learn that Roger's ex-girlfriend now attends Harvard University in this story focused on Southern insecurities. The second story examines the collapse of another relationship, but the third Admirer finds new affection, only to be lost as he returns to his routine obsession and meaningless present. The final three stories share two narrators. The fourth recounts the Montreal audition of another pianist who has, after three years, returned to his instrument as he finally begins to fall in love with a new woman. In the penultimate story, we rejoin Roger, who becomes an object of affection himself. The collection ends as the narrator from the fourth makes a move in his artistic career and finally encounters Rita, his lost object of admiration, resulting in his greatest, prettiest memory of their first falling in love.