Product Description

George and Nina seem like the perfect couple. They share a cozy, cluttered Brooklyn apartment, a taste for impromptu tuna casserole dinners, and a devotion to ballroom dancing lessons at Arthur Murray. They love each other. There's only one hitch: George is gay. And when Nina announces she's pregnant, things get especially complicated. Howard -- Nina's overbearing boyfriend and the baby's father -- wants marriage. Nina wants independence. George will do anything for a little unqualified affection, but is he ready to become an unwed surrogate dad? A touching and hilarious novel about love, friendship, and the many ways of making a family.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #575218 in Books
• Published on: 1991-03-15
• Released on: 1991-03-15
• Original language: English
• Dimensions: .88" h x 5.31" w x 8.24" l, .66 pounds
• Binding: Paperback
• 320 pages

From Amazon.com
It's no mistake that Stephen McCauley's The Object of My Affection ends at a carnival, for the book is, shockingly enough, not about ballroom dancing or Jennifer Aniston's hair, but rather a funny, bittersweet rumination on the thrill rides we endure and the trick mirrors through which we peer, all in the name of relationships.

George is a gay kindergarten teacher, holding a torch of the inextinguishable variety for his not-worth-it ex-boyfriend. Nina is a pregnant "almost-psychologist" feminist with a nail-polish obsession and an overbearing boyfriend. The focus of the novel is certainly on the relationship between these two, but McCauley also brings an entire fictional ensemble to life, richly nuanced with quirky humor. After a night utterly devoid of sleep, romance, or even physical comfort on a stranger's futon, George decides to cut his losses and leave in the middle of the night, silently wondering about his generation's aversion to mattresses: "I've never trusted people who feel compelled to replace them with uncomfortable, expensive substitutes." As he leaves, his blind date caps off the evening with some unsolicited dietary advice, advising him that he should really cut down on dairy. "Thanks," George deadpans. "I've been meaning to eliminate it from my diet. This should give me the extra push."

The Object of My Affection gets you to care about this screwed-up lot of characters as they attempt to force the square peg of life-as-it-is-wished into the round hole of life-as-it-is. It offers no pat resolutions but rather an overall sense of hope, made all the more believable by the fact that the author has not frantically tried to tie up every single loose end. Instead, George, Nina, and those who touch them manage to push off from their unreasonably idealistic visions of the future and anchor, albeit tenuously, to the blessings of the present, resolved to remain standing amidst the forces that move them, as McCauley writes, "as inevitable as death and much stronger than love." --Bob Michaels

From Publishers Weekly
This is the gently comic story of two insecure young people who share a Brooklyn apartment: a gay man and a pregnant woman who are both on the brink of financial and emotional disaster. PW found the first novel "leisurely and meandering," its characters "vibrant" and "charming."
Copyright 1988 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Library Journal
George is a gay kindergarten teacher who has just broken up with his lover. Nina is a lonely psychologist, in-between lovers, who needs a roommate. When George moves in with Nina, the two develop a satisfying friendship that survives all challenges, until the day Nina announces she is pregnant. Should Nina marry the father? Should George help her raise the babyor flee this frightening responsibility for life with a new lover in Vermont? Though the situation is interesting, both Nina and George are too vague and disorganized to fully engage the reader's sympathies. This first novel shows some nice touchesa good comic portrait of the baby's father, scathing commentary on a private kindergarten for young yuppiesbut ultimately it disappoints. A marginal purchase. Beth Ann Mills, New Rochelle P.L., N.Y.
Copyright 1987 Reed Business Information, Inc.