The Clasp

July 6, 2015
Taking a page from her essay collections (I Was Told There’d Be Cake and How Did You Get This Number), Crosley once again brandishes a mix of smarts and sarcasm to commemorate some of life’s more mortifying moments in her first work of fiction. The novel begins at a luxe wedding as once-close friends—Victor, a recently fired misanthropic data analyst at an Internet start-up; Kezia, the tightly wound second in command to an eccentric New York jeweler; and Nathaniel, a foppish, struggling TV writer in L.A.—rehash old sexual tensions and lament their stagnant existences since the carefree days of college a decade prior. A third of the way through the book, the narrative shifts from oft-explored late-20-something territory into a ridiculous yet entertaining comedy-of-errors adventure caper with doddering Victor at the helm. When the ailing mother of the groom discovers him drunkenly passed out on her bed the night of the wedding, she inexplicably reveals the whereabouts of a secret stash of jewels to him before dying—including a sketch of the long-lost 114-karat necklace featured in Guy de Maupassant’s famed short story “The Necklace” and clues to its supposed whereabouts. Victor’s harebrained attempts at tracking the necklace down, culminating in a French chateau break-in with a mildly concerned Kezia and Nathaniel in hot pursuit, make not only for fun reading but hint at the surprisingly poignant extent of just how far old acquaintances will go to save one another’s hides.

August 1, 2015
This debut novel from a bestselling essayist follows an interlinked circle of friends on a quest to find a priceless necklace and regain an even rarer treasure: a genuine connection. This trenchant first novel from the author of I Was Told There'd Be Cake (2008) and How Did You Get This Number (2010) is about a necklace; Guy de Maupassant's classic short story, "The Necklace"; and an interconnected circle of friends from college who, like beads on a broken necklace, have dispersed and rolled off on different paths. Some of these young people have gotten lost-or lost some essential part of themselves-along the way as they hurtle toward their 30s, watching their 20s blur by and disappear in the rearview mirror. While the luckier (wealthier, more successful) of them marry and move toward parenthood, three of the pals-hapless, unemployed data-crunching Brooklynite Victor; charismatic yet not quite successful LA screenwriter Nathaniel; and clever, spritelike Kezia, whose job working for an offbeat jewelry designer in Manhattan is, she fears, hardening her soul-all single, are beginning to wonder if they're wasting their lives pursuing goals as false and worthless as a paste gemstone. Crosley's smart, sardonic, sometimes-zany, yet also sensitive story is told from the alternating perspectives of these three linked characters, taking the readers along as they reunite first for a friend's wedding in Miami and then again for a road trip in France, setting off from Paris in pursuit of, yes, a priceless necklace but also of things far more valuable: the truth about themselves and one another, a genuine sense of purpose (or, at least, an antidote to their approaching anhedonia), and, perhaps most precious of all, a connection to one another. This novel about a chain of interlinked friends on the brink of their 30s has a few overly manufactured plot elements but overall is a real gem.

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September 15, 2015
Several years after they graduated from college together, far-flung friends Nathaniel, Kezia, and Victor reunite at a friend's wedding. An encounter there between Victor and the groom's mother sets in motion a transatlantic caper in search of the real necklace behind Guy de Maupassant's famed short story. The triangle could be classicVictor loves Kezia, who loves Nathaniel, who loves everyone or no onebut it isn't. And once our trio serendipitously reaches l'Hexagone, Victor to find that necklace, Kezia on a mission for work, Nathaniel just for fun, all bets are off; illusions and dreams are shed and shared with a new ease. Crosley, of the smart, humorous essay collections I Was Told There'd Be Cake (2008) and How Did You Get This Number? (2010) writes her three-dimensional characters' thoughts and dialogue with a clever crispness her fans would hope for, and she further stuns with a mastery of her first novel's setting and frame: a lavish Florida wedding, a crotchety Parisian jewelry designer's offices, a drive through enchantingand disturbingprovincial France. A great recommendation for NA readers, too.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2015, American Library Association.)

May 15, 2015

This is not Crosley's first book; her smartly funny essay collections such as I Was Told There'd Be Cake (a Thurber Prize finalist) have been New York Times best sellers. But it is her first novel. While attending a college friend's splashy wedding, twentysomethings Kezia, Nathaniel, and Victor learn about a valuable necklace that vanished in Nazi-occupied France, and they're off on a crazy chase that leads them to the estate of Guy de Maupassant, beloved for his classic short story "The Necklace."

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