- Wonder Boys
infobox Book |
name = Wonder Boys
title_orig =
translator =
image_caption = First edition cover
author =Michael Chabon
illustrator =
cover_artist =
country =United States
language = English
series =
genre =Novel
publisher = Villard Books
release_date =March 14 ,1995
english_release_date =
media_type = Print (Hardback &Paperback )
pages = 368 pp (first edition, hardback)
isbn = ISBN 0-679-41588-2 (first edition, hardback)
preceded_by =
followed_by ="Wonder Boys" is a 1995
novel byMichael Chabon . It was adapted into a film in 2000.Plot summary
Pittsburgh professor and author Grady Tripp is working on an unwieldy 2,611 page manuscript that is meant to be the follow-up to his successful, award-winning novel "The Land Downstairs", that was published seven years earlier. On the eve of a college-sponsored writers and publishers weekend called WordFest, two monumental things happen to Tripp: his wife walks out on him, and he learns that his mistress, who is also the chancellor of the college, Sara Gaskell, is pregnant with his child. To top it all off, Tripp finds himself involved in a bizarre crime involving one of his students, an alienated young writer named James Leer. During a party, Leer shoots and kills the chancellor's dog and steals her husband's prized
Marilyn Monroe collectible: the jacket worn by the starlet on her wedding day toJoe DiMaggio .Inspiration
The novel grew from Chabon's concerns with completing an unrealized novel, "Fountain City", about the construction of a perfect baseball park in
Florida . He decided to write a story about, in part, an author who couldn't finish his own work. The main character of Grady Tripp is admittedly based onUniversity of Pittsburgh professor,Chuck Kinder , who taught the undergraduate Chabon in the early 80s. Kinder's great opus, a novel inspired by his friendship with authorRaymond Carver , was reportedly more than 3000 pages long at one point. It was finally published in a very slimmed down version in 2001 as "Honeymooners: A Cautionary Tale."External links
* [http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=990CE2DE1738F934A25750C0A963958260 A Novel About a Novelist and His Messy Life:] Review by the NYTimes
* [http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2001/06/28/DD159592.DTL&type=books Writer who inspired Chabon's prize-winning novel about writers finally publishes his own … about writers] Article
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