David Leavitt - Böcker

At eighteen, Paul Porterfield aspires to play the piano at the world's great concert halls. So far the closest he has come has been to turn pages of sheet music for his idol, the dashing, temperamental Richard Kennington, a former piano prodigy on the cusp of middle age.Months later, while on holiday with his mother in Italy, Paul encounters Richard a second time. Their earlier attraction develops into an intense affair. As the innocence of first love becomes entangled with the quest for a more enduring happiness, Paul comes to realise that he cannot be a page turner all his life and that he has to confront his ambitions.With artful storytelling, shrewd perception and arch humour, THE PAGE TURNER testifies to the bittersweet truths of strained relationships and the resiliency of the human heart.

Set against the rise of fascism in 1930s Europe, WHILE ENGLAND SLEEPS tells the story of the love affair between Brian Botsford, an upper-class young writer, and Edward Phelan, an idealistic, self-educated employee of the London Underground and a member of the Communist party. Though by far the better educated of the two Brian is also more callow, convinced that his homosexuality is something he will outgrow. Edward, on the other hand, possesses 'an unproblematic capacity to accept' both Brian and the unorthodox nature of their love for each other - until one day, at the urging of his wealthy aunt Constance, Brian agrees to be set up with a 'suitable' young woman...and soon enough Edward is pushed to the point of crisis. Fleeing, he volunteers to fight in Spain, where he ends up in prison. Brian, responsible for Edward's flight, must pursue him across Europe, into the violent chaos of war.

To solve one of the great mathematical problems of his day, Alan Turing proposed an imaginary computer. Then, attempting to break a Nazi code during World War II, he successfully designed and built one, thus ensuring the Allied victory. Turing became a champion of artificial intelligence, but his work was cut short. As an openly gay man at a time when homosexuality was illegal in England, he was convicted and forced to undergo a humiliating "treatment" that may have led to his suicide.With a novelist's sensitivity, David Leavitt portrays Turing in all his humanity—his eccentricities, his brilliance, his fatal candor—and elegantly explains his work and its implications.

It's 1969 and Denny is on her way to the annual Thanksgiving dinner at the Wright's plush campus house. Denny is more nervous than usual because she has recently begun an affair with Dr Ernest Wright, a psychology professor who happens to be her boss. Needless to say, Ernest's wife Nancy doesn't suspect dowdy Denny of seducing her husband and continues to treat her more like a servant than a friend. To add to the tension, the Wright's only daughter is having a secret affair with Ernest's protege, and the youngest son, Ben, is as delicate and insufferable as only a poetry-writing fifteen-year-old can be. But this year the guests will include Nancy's best friend Anne and her new husband, the celebrated novelist Jonah Boyd, and this fateful holiday will turn out to be like no other.

This is a complete collection of moving, elegant and often witty short stories from one of America's most respected writers. Here, David Leavitt covers a range of challenging themes such as illness, grief and betrayal with his inimitable graceful touch. He takes the reader from Switzerland to San Francisco, and from a young man's attempt to contract the HIV virus to American tourists being startled by the local conventions in Italy. Bringing together "Family Dancing" (a finalist for both the National Book Award and the PEN/Faulkner Prize), "A Place I've Never Been" and "The Marble Quilt", this edition affirms David Leavitt's mastery of the short-story form.

January, 1913, Cambridge. G.H. Hardy - eccentric, charismatic and considered the greatest British mathematician of his age - receives a mysterious envelope covered with Indian stamps. Inside he finds a rambling letter from a self-professed mathematical genius who claims to be on the brink of solving the most important mathematical problem of his time. Hardy determines to learn more about this mysterious Indian clerk, Srinivasa Ramanujan, a decision that will profoundly affect not only his own life, and that of his friends, but the entire history of mathematics. Set against the backdrop of the First World War, and populated with such luminaries as D.H. Lawrence and Bertrand Russell, "The Indian Clerk" fashions from this fascinating period an utterly compelling story about our need to find order in the world.

The story of Alan Turing, the persecuted genius who helped break the Enigma code and create the modern computer.To solve one of the great mathematical problems of his day, Alan Turing proposed an imaginary programmable calculating machine. But the idea of actually producing a 'thinking machine' did not crystallise until he and his brilliant Bletchley Park colleagues built devices to crack the Nazis' Enigma code, thus ensuring the Allied victory in the Second World War. In so doing, Turing became a champion of artificial intelligence, formulating the famous (and still unbeaten) Turing test that challenges our ideas of human consciousness.But Turing's work was cut short when, as an openly gay man in a time when homosexuality was illegal in Britain, he was apprehended by the authorities and sentenced to a 'treatment' that amounted to chemical castration. Ultimately, it lead to his suicide, and it wasn't until 2013, after many years of campaigning, that he received a posthumous royal pardon. With a novelist's sensitivity, David Leavitt portrays Turing in all his humanity - his eccentricities, his brilliance, his fatal candour - while elegantly explaining his work and its implications.

'Very funny and unexpected, a material response to our times, plush as velvet' Rachel Cusk'A wickedly funny and emotionally expansive novel' Jenny OffillIt is the Saturday after the 2016 presidential election, and in a plush weekend house in Connecticut, a group of New Yorkers has gathered to recover from what they consider the greatest political catastrophe of their lives. Liberal and like-minded, the friends have come to the countryside in the hope of restoring the bubble in which they have grown used to living.Moving through her days accompanied by a carefully curated salon, Eva Lindquist is a generous hostess with an obsession for decorating. Yet when, in her avidity to secure shelter for herself, she persuades her husband to buy a grand if dilapidated apartment in Venice, she unwittingly sets off the chain of events that will propel him to venture outside the bubble and embark on an unexpected love affair.A slyly comic look at the shelter industry, Shelter in Place is a novel about house and home, safety and freedom and the insidious ways in which political upheaval can undermine even the most seemingly impregnable foundations.

'One of his generation's most gifted writers.' New York Times'An amazingly perceptive novel.' San Francisco Chronicle'Fascinating... lingers in the mind' New York Times Book ReviewOwen and Rose are facing serious challenges to their married life of routine and monotony as New York City grows and changes around them. They spend most Sundays apart; while Rose buries herself in crosswords and newspapers, Owen visits gay porn theaters.But when they discover they may lose their apartment and their son, prompted by his new relationship, reveals his homosexuality, their lives cannot continue as they were. Owen and Rose are forced to confront not only their son’s revelation but also Owen’s latent homosexuality. Poignant and lingering, this is a tale of love and relationships, secrets and unspoken desires.