All The News I Need probes the modern American response to inevitable, ancient riddles—of love and sex and mortality. Frances Ferguson is a lonely, sharp-tongued widow who lives in the wine country. Oliver Gaffney is a painfully shy gay man who guards a secret and lives out equally lonely days in San Francisco. Friends by default, Fran and Ollie nurse the deep anomie of loss and the creeping, animal betrayal of aging. Each loves routine but is anxious that life might be passing by. To crack open this stalemate, Fran insists the two travel together to Paris. The aftermath of their funny, bittersweet journey suggests those small changes, within our reach, that may help us save ourselves—somewhere toward the end.
Joan Frank (www.joanfrank.org) is the author of six books of fiction and a book of collected essays. All the News I Need, her fourth novel, won the 2016 Juniper Prize for Fiction. Her last story collection, In Envy Country, won the Richard Sullivan Prize and ForeWord Reviews Book of the Year Award. Joan's book of essays, Because You Have to: A Writing Life, won the Silver ForeWord Reviews Book of the Year Award. A MacDowell Colony Fellow and recipient of many grants and honors, Joan also reviews literary fiction for the San Francisco Chronicle. She lives in the North Bay.
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