Now in paperback!
“A delightful, funny novel that asks the question, Is writing about happiness an important thing to do?—while doing exactly that, so beautifully and convincingly that it’s like a magic trick.” —Maile Meloy, author of Do Not Become Alarmed
“A novel that is both an argument about art and a compelling example of it.” —New York Times Book Review
“It is joyful and comforting to read a novel with loving, complicated characters who aren’t defeated by life—despite many reasons they could be.” —Washington Post
“Overstuffed with bittersweet beauty.” —Los Angeles Times
It’s 1991. Em is new to New York, down to her last nineteen dollars, working as a literary agent’s assistant. She makes two close friends: Emily, a firebrand theater director living in a Lower East Side squat, and Lucy, a middle-aged novelist and single mom. Her life revolves around these two women and their vividly disparate views of art. But who is she, and what does she want to become?
It’s 2005. Em is now Emily, a successful book editor, happily married, struggling with a new baby. She turns around and these two old relationships are back in her life: Lucy’s posthumous work needs a publisher, and her ex-friend Emily wants to rekindle their attachment. These two women from her past—one dead, one very alive—force Emily to reckon with her decisions, her failures, and what kind of creative life she wants to lead.
Vintage Contemporaries is a novel about art, parenthood, loyalty, and fighting for a cause—the times we do the right thing, and the times we fail—set in New York City on either side of the millennium.
“Vintage Contemporaries is about many things—art, friendship, youth, desire, a very particular slice of New York City—but what makes this masterful debut sing is Dan Kois’s dazzling excavation of the human heart and all its contradictions, mystery, and beauty. Smart, laugh-out-loud funny, and consistently surprising, this novel is a gem.” —Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney, author of The Nest and Good Company
“Vintage Contemporaries is an elegant and tender exploration of friendship, the passage of time, and what we lose and gain in the process of becoming ourselves. Part elegiac, part mindful of what nostalgia can obscure about the past, Dan Kois’s novel provides precise insight into the defining moments of youth and adulthood, and finds grace and abundant possibility in both.” —Danielle Evans, author of The Office of Historical Corrections
“What a warm and delightful novel about friendship, responsibility, ambition, and legacy. Poignant without being treacly, Vintage Contemporaries is a time capsule of the recent past, and a wry and tender work of art.” —Lydia Kiesling, author of The Golden State
“Vintage Contemporaries is about being young and becoming less young; exploring friendship (sometimes magical, sometimes messy); parenthood (ditto); and how to reconcile youthful ambition and ideals with real life. It’s a warm and bighearted coming-of-age story that made me wistful for my own twenties, set in a vividly rendered and long-vanished New York City.” —Rumaan Alam, author of Leave the World Behind
“A bravura first novel … a delectably smart, witty, caring, and radiating read.” —Booklist
“Exceptionally warm-hearted ... mounts a convincing case for such uncool causes as good taste over fashionable taste, editing as creative craft work, and smart novels where everything matters only as much as it ever matters in life.” —Vox
“For unclear reasons, Kois has named both characters Emily.” —Kirkus Reviews