East Fifth Bliss

by Douglas Light

There are seven defining moments in a person's life. For Morris Bliss, the difficulty is in knowing which moments are defining. At age thirty-five, Morris Bliss is clamped in the jaws of New York City inertia - he wants to travel but has no money; he needs a job but has no prospects; he still shares a walk-up apartment with his father. Enter Stefani, an eighteen-year-old girl in a Catholic school uniform, and Morris's once static life quickly unravels when Stefani's father, oblivious to his daughter's actions, calls on Morris to work for him. Morris's life becomes further entangled when his best friend, N.J., is recruited by an international cartel that controls global economics and local sex markets, and Morris is called in to save N.J.'s bacon. But most importantly, Morris's father, a taciturn widower, finally reveals the truth surrounding the strange death of Morris's mother. A body at rest will remain at rest. Unless acted upon. With the agony of his inertia finally broken, Morris Bliss fights to keep his life from careening out of control. He must learn to adapt if he is to survive.

Genres: Fiction

220 pages, Paperback

First published September 1, 2006

About the author

Douglas Light is an award-winning novelist, screenwriter, and short story writer. His novel, East Fifth Bliss, won the 2007 Benjamin Franklin Award for Fiction. He co-wrote the screen adaptation of East Fifth Bliss, which star Michael C. Hall, Peter Fonda, Lucy Liu, and Sarah Shahi. His story collection, Girls in Trouble, received the AWP 2010 Grace Paley Prize. It will be published by the University of Massachusetts Press in October 2011. His novel, Where Night Stops, will be published in January 2012.
His fiction has won an O. Henry Prize and appeared in the Best American Nonrequired Reading anthology, Narrative, Guernica, Alaska Quarterly Review, and other publications.

Reviews

[Jill · Rating 3 out of 5]

I mean...this was fine. It should've been longer; it was inexpertly constructed; the characters weren't notably rendered; it was ultimately forgettable, BUT. It captured something interesting about identity crises, and the New York City within its pages stretches up, high.

[Nefariousbig · Rating 5 out of 5]

READER EPIPHANY* LIES as defined by writers for writers: "One thing I learned in prison in Haiti man, keeping 100% true to a tale isn’t what’s important, it’s the story, the moral, whether it lingers and lives on after it’s been told, that man, that’s what’s important. Page 12. Bing!"

*pun intended: author Douglas Light is a founding editor of Epiphany Magazine. http://www.epiphanyzine.com/news.html

[Cindy · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book meanders through Morris Bliss's life, a 35 year old, unemployed man. At first, I thought there are just too many unrelated things going on, however, nearing the end it begins to make sense. I was really, really happy with the ending. If you can be patient with the journey, enjoy the humor, then you will land at the touching ending.

[Marcus Graves · Rating 1 out of 5]

Bloody Eagles. Is this trying to be a Bro-Comedy? I saw the movie and I read the book. So much that make up these projects come off as early-draft ideas that will be worked out by either the author or editor or director at a later date - but wasn't. Why did I see the movie? I saw the movie for the same reason that I saw the Da Vinci Code - my girlfriend had read the book and so if a book she's read is made into a movie then she just has to see it. I finished the book on the cab ride to the movie. The things we do for love. If only the people behind these projects had any sort of love for the craft they claim they represent - then maybe I wouldn't be writing this. Thanks for offering the world yet another mound of consumer-based crap. Thanks for Jet Ski. A big guy thats intimidating but sensitive... so original! I feel as if the author stole this story from a lame Broadway show about two friends that need to grow up together - how cliche. And how does Bliss overcome his obstacles of Holden Caulfield-esque immaturity? BY GOING TO GREECE...he always wanted to travel but never could get around to it regardless of how kind he is... okay, George Bailey. I think the old Savings and Loan will be better off without you and Jet Ski and a book about a grown man falling for a young girl in the LES. Spoiler Alert!

[Gregory Allen · Rating 5 out of 5]

I stumbled across this novel last year and read it before I ever knew it was being made into a movie. Glad that I did! Great NY setting of a character like none other. Morris Bliss is a fascinating man simply trying to survive in a very real way in the East Village.

[Erik Raschke · Rating 5 out of 5]

A classmate of mine. I'm happy to see he has written a quirky, funny book.

[Bethany Fancher · Rating 5 out of 5]

There is a description in this story so vivid I got it confused with my own memory of something that happened in my life.

[Donna · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a great read. Highly entertaining, funny, quirky - loved the characters and how they related to each other. Great story.

[Melly · Rating 1 out of 5]

started off strongly but had a bland ending. seemed like a listless story

[Pattie F. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well when I finally got into it after the first chapter, it turned out to be an entertaining book with quite a strange ending...

[Phillip Artavia · Rating 2 out of 5]

Maybe 2.5 stars if I'm feeling generous.