Joseph Olshan – författare

Ten years ago, Will's lover disappeared on a night swim in the Pacific. Was Will's emptiness a feeling of mourning or rejection? He now meets Sean, who is himself the object of a passionate fatal obsession. As they dodge one another, they move in a network of self-conscious, gym-obsessed men.

When David's mother brought Clara Mayfield from Jamaica to live in their affluent household, David told the exotic intruder to go back to where she came from. But the indomitable Clara would take no nonsense, and soon began to capture David's affections.

When Sam Solomon sees a stunning erotic drawing in the home of a dying art dealer, he is overwhelmed by a tide of confusion and longing. The dealer has hired Sam to write his memoirs yet withholds crucial information - information that Sam suspects 'Vanitas', the drawing, may hold answers to.

Clara, heroine of "Clara's Heart" and the former nanny of Will Kaplan, another of Olshan's beloved characters from "Nightswimmer", comes once more to his rescue: Marie Claire, Will's friend and mother of his former lover, may have been caught in the catastrophic jumbo-jet crash off Long Island. Yet mysteriously the airline throws her very boarding of the doomed plane into doubt. So where is she? As the conundrum looms, Will's past loves and obsessions unfold with gripping intensity - the ghost of his brother Daniel, killed in a fatal skiing accident, the aching memories of Peter. Clara is aware that to the outside world 'an elderly black woman and a young white man didn't add up,' but she and Will are tied into a bond as strong as any blood family's, and Will needs his old nanny's wit and heart now more than ever. Joseph Olshan interweaves the narrative threads with spellbinding agility. He shows how people may choose families different to those into which they are born, and how , through love, past personal failings may be forged into redemptive new beginnings.

A powerful novel of family secrets, doomed passion, and the fragile love between a bisexual man and an emotionally damaged woman A talented musician, James arrives in Italy in 1983, just ahead of the panic in New York City caused by the burgeoning AIDS epidemic. In Rome, the Eternal City, he meets Diana. Their attraction is intense and immediate. A passionate relationship is born and soon they are inseparable, reveling in their shared love of art and Italian culture. But storm clouds hang over their union: dark secrets of abuse from his youth, her pain over her brother’s death, and James’s open admission that he has known other men sexually. Back in New York, their relationship falls apart. For James and Diana, it is time to move on; to come to terms with the ghosts that haunt their lives and family histories; to find new paths and new lovers. But the darkness of their relationship is inescapable and persistent even though their love is gone. James has received news that will impact both their lives in devastating ways: He is HIV positive. Joseph Olshan’s The Sound of Heaven is an extraordinary novel, at once romantic and troubling, terrifying and compassionate.

In this brilliant literary mosaic centered around a love affair, acclaimed novelist Joseph Olshan explores the intense pressures and passions of gay life in New York City during the AIDS epidemic Ten years ago, Will Kaplan and his lover went for a night swim in the Pacific Ocean—but only Will emerged. In the decade that followed, Will relocated to the other end of the continent, filling his days with shallow and pointless affairs, unable to come to terms with the bizarre disappearance that could have been a tragic drowning, a well-planned abandonment, or both. While immersing himself in New York’s gay bar and disco scene, and a hedonistic Fire Island culture darkened by the grim specter of AIDS, Will meets Sean Paris, a young man as tortured and damaged by the past as Will himself. Drawn together by mutual doubts, needs, secrets, and obsessions, the intense relationship that they form will make waves in their circles of friends and ex-lovers, transforming Will’s life forever.  

In this follow-up to Olshan’s acclaimed debut novel, the unforgettable Clara, a tough and deeply caring Jamaican housekeeper, returns to help a troubled friend solve a mystery and deal with tragic loss Ever since childhood, Will Kaplan has trusted one person—his family’s Jamaican housekeeper, Clara—to help him get through the pain and tragedy that have all too frequently invaded his life. When his brother, Danny, died suddenly, Clara was there to offer strength and comfort. When Will was confined to a mental hospital, she gave him hope and purpose. Now he needs her wisdom and counsel as never before in the wake of a horrific plane crash that may have taken the life of Will’s dear friend Marie, the mother of his former lover, Peter. When he learns that Marie may not actually have been aboard the doomed flight, Will is suddenly faced with an altogether different dilemma: how to find Marie, who apparently vanished while on her way to see him. It will mean an uneasy reunion with Peter, who’s embroiled in his own family crisis. But if he places his damaged heart and troubled soul in Clara’s loving and capable hands once again, Will might just weather the emotional storm that is brewing all around him and emerge a stronger person because of it.

The pursuit of Eros, the yearning for intimacy, and the struggle to reconcile bisexuality with a longing for children -- these are the desires etched in the hearts of the characters of this brave and probing novel by the award-winning author of Clara''s Heart and Nightswimmer. The moment that Sam Solomon, the protagonist of Vanitas, is transfixed by an erotic drawing that hangs in the apartment of a dying art dealer, Elliot Garland, he finds himself caught in an under-tow of confusion and longing. Garland, stricken with AIDS, has hired Sam to write his memoirs and yet manages to withhold crucial information about his life. Sam suspects, however, that the drawing, called Vanitas, is the relic of a dramatic, and secret, history that could provide answers to the questions his subject has refused to address. Vanitas explores the intersections between the disparate worlds of art and art restoration, publishing, and urban relationships, all of which are in the grip of an implacable epidemic. As Sam traverses the landscapes of disease, romance, and mystery, he is enveloped by a culture in which individuals make tenuous connections with one another as land mines explode all around them. And as he negotiates the hazards of the volatile allegiances and jealousies attendant to his own romantic entanglements, he finds himself face to face with a familiar existential dilemma -- the desire to raise a child despite society''s condemnation of nontraditional families. A brilliantly written story of the lonely, painful search for happiness in unconventional choices, Vanitas is a rare novel -- a daring orchestration of event and character that is a bold, hopeful, and accomplished piece of literature.

One night, two men waving guns and knives break and enter their Paris hotel room, terrorizing Russell and his much older companion, a famous American poet named Edward Cannon. The intruders, not finding what they seemingly expected, leave without further incident. But the baffling, traumatic events overwhelm Cannon who dies in his sleep later that night. Now Russell is left to ponder the meaning of the attack, what to do with the poet's unfinished, problematic memoir and, perhaps most importantly, how to reconstruct and move forward with his own life.Hearing of the disturbing circumstances of Cannon's death, an Italian writer, Marina Vezzoli, invites Russell to recuperate at her villa in Tuscany. But what at first seems like a generous invitation slowly reveals itself to be a calculated offer. As Russell's stay in Italy lengthens, he begins to realize that the people in his life are using or manipulating him, most of all the poet's New York publishers who, against the dying poet's wishes, are trying to acquire his unfinished manuscript. Looming over everything is the long and fascinating legacy of Villa Guidi, where during Word War II a Jewish family hid in the subterranean floors, later undergoing a conversion to Catholicism. In an echo of this dramatic history, Russell is forced to undergo a conversion of his own in order to find redemption and meaning in his life.

Award-winning author Joseph Olshan’s latest novel, Milo’s Reckoning, follows a grieving New York PhD student through an investigation into the death of his mentor, leading him along a trail of dark clues that take him to Italy and beyond.When Milo Rossi, a graduate student in Italian at New York University, learns of the sudden and mysterious death of his mentor, Lenny D'Ambrosio, despite the official ruling of suicide, he suspects foul play. Embarking on a quest for answers, his investigation unexpectedly intertwines with the accidental death of his brother, Carlo, six years prior. As Milo delves deeper, he encounters unsettling truths about his brother's life and death, uncovering a web of secrets and hidden connections. His search takes him across New York City and eventually to Italy, where he stumbles upon a horrifying reality: a network of human sex trafficking and exploitation. Confronted with the harsh realities of human suffering and the complexities of justice, Milo's journey is one of personal reckoning and profound transformation. He must confront his own grief, question his assumptions, and ultimately decide how to respond to the darkness he has uncovered.