Less Is Lost (Arthur Less #2)

by Andrew Sean Greer

Slowly, the impossible dawned on him, and with terror he was forced to look deep within himself, as we all someday must, and ask: Am I the only frigid homosexual in New York?

What is this sensation? Of being free of something you thought you had conquered, only to have it lash out with a tentacle to draw you back?

He thought he was the only one for whom ordering a deli sandwich and wrestling an alligator held equal levels of terror. It is one of the reasons I always think of him as the bravest man I know—for who can guess what feats of valor he has overcome simply to arrive at your door?

Less comes to understand that life for some goes smoothly, as free from incident as it is perhaps from poetry; a fainter kind of happiness than Less has ever perceived. We are all having different experiences.