The Shadow Man
A Novel
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- $7.99
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- $7.99
Publisher Description
In this first novel, Sofia Shafquat combines the insightful humor of Cathy Guisewite with a fresh new literary voice and a quintessentially California milieu. She speaks to women of the nineties who still remember lifetimes spent waiting for elusive and resistant men. What makes them such shadows? What would it have taken to make them real?
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Shafquat's sparkling, tell-it-like-it-is debut exposes the prime hazards of dating today. Laden with pop psychology and fashion-magazine views of female-male interaction, it rings true nonetheless. Narrator Leslie Kovalsky, a sanguine 29-year-old Southern Californian, has an uncanny knack for choosing inauspicious liaisons. Among her misalliances is a lustful fling with a hang-gliding instructor named Geoff, which ends when Geoff admits he lives with another woman, German immigrant Cornelia. Leslie confronts Cornelia with the truth; Cornelia promptly dumps the swine to move in with Leslie. With her perceptive observations and imperfect English, Cornelia turns out to be a charming housemate, and it is she who introduces the title's ``shadow'' concept, based on the premise that men's attachments to women are insubstantial. Another engaging personality here is a prototypical beach bum called Unicorn, the Love Doctor, who quotes classic poetry while counseling Leslie on romance. This uncynical and diverting novel and its fresh heroine provide examples of the wit, emotional resilience and self-sufficiency necessary for successful single life. Shafquat is a former editor at Rodale .
