Hailed as Elizabeth Spencer's best novel (Michael Gorra, New York Review of Books), this lost masterpiece of midcentury America traces the decline of the fortunate and the search for redemption in Kennedy-era America.
Winner of five O. Henry Awards and the 2013 Rea Prize for Short Fiction, Elizabeth Spencer has long been considered a master of the short story, yet her novels are no less a showcase for her uncanny ability to depict how "twisted, chafing, inescapable, and life-supporting" (Alice Munro) the ties that bind families and marriages are. Nowhere are these skills more evident than in her fourth novel, No Place for an Angel, a Jamesian portrait of Cold War America that follows two fracturing marriages—Catherine and Jerry Sasser, a Texas heiress and a ruthless political fixer, and Irene and Charles Waddell, a worldly pair involved with American policymaking in Italy—as they cross paths from the oil fields of Texas to Rome and New York. Witty,...
Hailed as Elizabeth Spencer's best novel (Michael Gorra, New York Review of Books ), this lost masterpiece of midcentury America traces the decline of the fortunate and the search for redemption in Kennedy-era America.
Winner of five O. Henry Awards and the 2013 Rea Prize for Short Fiction, Elizabeth Spencer has long been considered a master of the short story, yet her novels are no less a showcase for her uncanny ability to depict how "twisted, chafing, inescapable, and life-supporting" (Alice Munro) the ties that bind families and marriages are. Nowhere are these skills more evident than in her fourth novel, No Place for an Angel , a Jamesian portrait of Cold War America that follows two fracturing marriages―Catherine and Jerry Sasser, a Texas heiress and a ruthless political fixer, and Irene and Charles Waddell, a worldly pair involved with American policymaking in Italy―as they cross paths from the oil fields of Texas to Rome and New York. Witty, mordant, but above all deeply perceptive of the secret emotional worlds of her characters, Spencer portrays the limitless ambition of the postwar world, the soaring rise of her characters, and, finally, their diminishing fortunes, which lead to smaller but firmer destinies.
Review
"Elizabeth Spencer seems to have spent her life watching, observing, always paying close attention, and for her it's the whole truth or nothing. As far as I can tell, she never missed a thing."
― Malcolm Jones, New York Times Book Review
"She has an uncanny ability to let the human dilemmas play themselves out on a social plane. Elizabeth Spencer's lightness of touch feels buttressed by an eagerness to grapple with the darkest struggles we all face daily."
― Allan Gurganus
"Spencer [is] an elegant and subtle writer…Like Chekhov, the moments of most acute misery―those achingly common things that nearly kill us all―are offstage…which makes the cumulative effect all the more alarming."
― Ann Beattie, San Francisco Chronicle
About the Author
Winner of the PEN/Malamud prize and five O. Henry awards, Elizabeth Spencer (1921―2019) was the author of nine novels, six short story collections, a memoir, and a play.
Description:
Hailed as Elizabeth Spencer's best novel (Michael Gorra, New York Review of Books), this lost masterpiece of midcentury America traces the decline of the fortunate and the search for redemption in Kennedy-era America.
Winner of five O. Henry Awards and the 2013 Rea Prize for Short Fiction, Elizabeth Spencer has long been considered a master of the short story, yet her novels are no less a showcase for her uncanny ability to depict how "twisted, chafing, inescapable, and life-supporting" (Alice Munro) the ties that bind families and marriages are. Nowhere are these skills more evident than in her fourth novel, No Place for an Angel, a Jamesian portrait of Cold War America that follows two fracturing marriages—Catherine and Jerry Sasser, a Texas heiress and a ruthless political fixer, and Irene and Charles Waddell, a worldly pair involved with American policymaking in Italy—as they cross paths from the oil fields of Texas to Rome and New York. Witty,...
Hailed as Elizabeth Spencer's best novel (Michael Gorra, New York Review of Books ), this lost masterpiece of midcentury America traces the decline of the fortunate and the search for redemption in Kennedy-era America.
Winner of five O. Henry Awards and the 2013 Rea Prize for Short Fiction, Elizabeth Spencer has long been considered a master of the short story, yet her novels are no less a showcase for her uncanny ability to depict how "twisted, chafing, inescapable, and life-supporting" (Alice Munro) the ties that bind families and marriages are. Nowhere are these skills more evident than in her fourth novel, No Place for an Angel , a Jamesian portrait of Cold War America that follows two fracturing marriages―Catherine and Jerry Sasser, a Texas heiress and a ruthless political fixer, and Irene and Charles Waddell, a worldly pair involved with American policymaking in Italy―as they cross paths from the oil fields of Texas to Rome and New York. Witty, mordant, but above all deeply perceptive of the secret emotional worlds of her characters, Spencer portrays the limitless ambition of the postwar world, the soaring rise of her characters, and, finally, their diminishing fortunes, which lead to smaller but firmer destinies.
Review
"Elizabeth Spencer seems to have spent her life watching, observing, always paying close attention, and for her it's the whole truth or nothing. As far as I can tell, she never missed a thing."
― Malcolm Jones, New York Times Book Review
"She has an uncanny ability to let the human dilemmas play themselves out on a social plane. Elizabeth Spencer's lightness of touch feels buttressed by an eagerness to grapple with the darkest struggles we all face daily."
― Allan Gurganus
"Spencer [is] an elegant and subtle writer…Like Chekhov, the moments of most acute misery―those achingly common things that nearly kill us all―are offstage…which makes the cumulative effect all the more alarming."
― Ann Beattie, San Francisco Chronicle
About the Author
Winner of the PEN/Malamud prize and five O. Henry awards, Elizabeth Spencer (1921―2019) was the author of nine novels, six short story collections, a memoir, and a play.