Author of the award-winning New York Times bestseller House of Sand and Fog, which was adapted for the screen and starred Jennifer Connelly and Ben Kingsley and was nominated for an Oscar, Andre Dubus III presents readers with a relentless and captivating new novel about one of the most defining episodes in recent history. Inspired by rumors that one of the September 11 terrorists had enjoyed the pleasures of Western society days before crashing his plane into the Twin Towers, the author unravels American society before the attack, recounting how ordinary citizens lived alongside terrorists, unaware of what the future held for them, and how good and bad feelings can coexist in the same mind. One September night in 2001, in Florida, stripper April is forced to leave her young daughter with the manager of Club Puma, the nightclub where she works, when the babysitter falls ill. It is there that Lonnie, the bouncer, prevents the daredevils from disrespecting the dancers. It's where AJ, an excavator operator, tries to forget his family problems. Where the Arab Bassam seeks the pleasures denied by the rigors of Islam: alcohol, cigarettes, and women. From the encounter of these explosive elements, THE GARDEN OF THE LAST DAYS, which also appeared on the New York Times bestseller list, is a sensitive and tormented novel that alternates between despair and fulfillment, maternal love and lust, fanaticism and relativism. Andre Dubus III gives voice and life to all his characters, who travel through roads, nightclubs, homes, churches, and motels in search of some form of redemption.
