SO MUCH BLUE

Absorbing in its simplicity about bourgeois banality and the quest for expression New York Times So Much Blue is a gorgeous novel about art memory and self deception from the author of Erasure now an Oscar nominated film Kevin Pace is working on a painting that he won t allow anyone to see not his children not his best friend Richard not even his wife Linda The painting is a canvas of twelve feet by twenty one feet and three inches covered entirely in shades of blue It may be his masterpiece or it may not he doesn t know nor does he particularly care What Kevin does care about are the events of the past the affair he had with a young artist in Paris ten years ago and further back his journey to an El Salvador on the brink of war to retrieve Richard s drug dealing brother So Much Blue is a brilliant examination of how the past collides with present and the secrets we keep from even ourselves Part of the Picador Collection a series celebrating fifty years of Picador books and showcasing the best of modern literature So Much Blue is such a perfectly structured novel A generous thrilling book by a man who might well be America s most under recognized literary master NPR