Wise Men: A Novel Audiobook

Quotes

• “An absorbing, well-crafted book, with all the storytelling virtues on display. It is atmospheric, thoughtful, and mature, with characters whose fate arouses genuine curiosity. It is fiction of great integrity and vast promise.”

  — Hilary Mantel, Booker Prize-winning author

• “Wise Men is a brilliantly plotted and carefully observed novel that takes the reader deep inside a powerful family’s most guarded secrets...Wise Men confirms that Stuart Nadler is a writer of abundant talent and grace.”

  — Amber Dermont, New York Times bestselling author

• “Stuart Nadler is an elegant writer and a compelling storyteller. Wise Men explores the big questions in life—love and money and race and identity—in a story packed with secrets, longings, and obsessions. It is not a book to be missed.”

  — Vanessa Diffenbaugh, New York Times  bestselling author

• “While Stuart Nadler’s ambitious debut novel touches on money, class, race, and religion, first and foremost Wise Men is about youth, betrayal, and regret. In his idealism and denial, Hilly Wise, the poor little rich boy, is a truly American character and the perfect narrator for the tale.”

  — Stewart O’Nan, New York Times bestselling author

• “Rendered in the son’s words at different stages of his life, Wise Men artfully shows how the intricacies of human interactions play out over time.”

  — Barnes & Noble, editorial review

• “Genuinely moving.”

  — Boston Globe

• “A sweeping epic of race and family in America…Nadler’s portrait of doomed romance, along with dissections of wealth and success worthy of John Cheever, make this a very exciting debut.”

  — Publishers Weekly

• “This debut novel from the author of the well-received story collection The Book of Life has much to recommend it…The novel is perhaps most essentially a tragic love story, skillfully examining the complications of Hilton’s impossible relationship with Savannah, a poor, young, African American woman he meets at his family’s new beachfront property on Cape Cod. Hilton, the narrator of the novel, is exceptionally well drawn, and Nadler insightfully explores the dangerous power of class and privilege, which dooms this young love affair. Verdict: A novel of considerable power and pathos that lovers of literary fiction will want.”

  — Library Journal

• “This is a novel of character, persuasive in the telling, less so in retrospect but still impressive; Nadler is a born storyteller.”

  — Kirkus Reviews

• “Wise Men reads like a classic; it is a completely engrossing novel, one that scars the reader’s heart in the most satisfying way. In confident, unpretentious prose, Nadler tackles the complexity of racial tension and fifties mores in a manner reminiscent of Harper Lee and Carson McCullers…Wise Men is, at its core, a brutal love story, full of surprise and conviction, insight and deception, staggering wealth and loss, truth and beauty.”

  — Megan Mayhew Bergman, author of Birds of a Lesser Paradise

• “Stuart Nadler’s first novel zooms and dips like an airplane with a trick pilot, one in complete control of his loop-de-loops. I have no doubt that Stuart Nadler is going to be one of our great novelists, and it all starts here, on a dune in Cape Cod, with the Wise men. These characters—knotted together with obligation, guilt, and love—will stay with me always.”

  — Emma Straub, author of Other People We Married

• “Hilly Wise is determined not to be anything like his father, Arthur, a renowned litigator whose legendary wealth Hilly despises. Narrator Bernard Clark characterizes both voices with so much contrast that there’s no doubt the two men are polar opposites. The sarcastic and pessimistic Hilly stands out perfectly against the exuberant and bombastic Arthur. The setting of the story ranges from the shores of Cape Cod, where Hilly fancies the niece of Lem Dawson, the black caretaker of the Wise property, to the fields of Iowa, where Hilly’s verboten love, Savannah, resides. Clark paints that forbidden romance with equal parts frustration and sarcasm. Nadler’s story of opportunities lost and found is well crafted, and Clark is a wonderful storyteller.”

  — AudioFile

• "Wise Men reads like a classic; it is a completely engrossing novel, one that scars the reader's heart in the most satisfying way. In confident, unpretentious prose, Nadler tackles the complexity of racial tension and fifties mores in a manner reminiscent of Harper Lee and Carson McCullers, and in a smart, misses-nothing style that summons comparisons to Salinger and Cheever. Hilton Wise is a winsome and compelling narrator, one you'll find yourself rooting for days after finishing the book. Nadler's deft rendering of place, namely a secluded compound in coastal Massachusetts, allows the reader to become completely lost in Hilly's world. Wise Men is, at its core, a brutal love story, full of surprise and conviction, insight and deception, staggering wealth and loss, truth and beauty.

  — Megan Mayhew Bergman, author of BIRDS OF A LESSER PARADISE

• Wise Men is a brilliantly plotted and carefully observed novel that takes the reader deep inside a powerful family's most guarded secrets. An epic saga about a son's need to atone for the sins of his father and the sins of his own troubled youth. The driving heart of this ambitious novel is an impossible romance: one worth risking an entire outrageous fortune. With wisdom and compassion, Nadler examines the mysteries and manners of unrequited love. Wise Men confirms that Stuart Nadler is a writer of abundant talent and grace.

  — Amber Dermont, author of the New York Times bestseller The Starboard Sea

• Stuart Nadler is an elegant writer and a compelling storyteller. Wise Men explores the big questions in life---love and money and race and identity---in a story packed with secrets, longings, and obsessions. It is not a book to be missed.

  — Vanessa Diffenbaugh, author of the New York Times bestseller The Language of Flowers

• Stuart Nadler's first novel zooms and dips like an airplane with a trick pilot, one in complete control of his loop-de-loops. I have no doubt that Stuart Nadler is going to be one of our great novelists, and it all starts here, on a dune in Cape Cod, with the Wise men. These characters--knotted together with obligation, guilt, and love--will stay with me always.

  — Emma Straub, author of OTHER PEOPLE WE MARRIED and LAURA LAMONT'S LIFE IN PICTURES

• While Stuart Nadler's ambitious debut novel touches on money, class, race and religion, first and foremost Wise Men is about youth, betrayal and regret. In his idealism and denial, Hilly Wise, the poor little rich boy, is a truly American character, and the perfect narrator for the tale.

  — Stewart O'Nan, author of Emily, Alone and The Odds