Straight Man / by Richard Russo

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Richard Russo won a 2001 Pulitzer for his novel Empire Falls, which examines the dismal lives of people in a small Maine town. The author of over 10 mainstream novels, he's recently broken into Hollywood as screenplay author and script editor for the films Keeping Mum, Ice Harvest and 2007's Bridge of Sighs, based on his novel of the same name. Straight Man takes an introspectively humorous look at Academic life following an acting English department head at a small college through a particularly turbulent period of the semester.
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Professor William Henry Devereaux, Jr.--"Hank"--might be stuck as a tenured writing teacher at remote liberal arts college, but you don't have to tell him. He's well-aware of it. At the moment however, any midlife career angst he does feel is meshed against equally pressing issues like budget cuts forecasting doom for the already underfunded English department, lingering suspicions that his wife may be having an affair, unruly students, quibbling faculty and one particularly vital bodily (dys)function causing him indescribable pain. When a querulous incident involving a halloween mask, a live duck and a TV news camera makes Hank a 48 hour local celebrity, it's all he can do to maintain his composure and elicit control as acting head of the department.

Despite its somewhat misleading title, Straight Man--intended to connote a straight-forward individual in the company of fakers--is an amusing, jocular novel on the paradoxical absurdities of Academic life. Almost a Catch-22 styled plot with its abundance of oddball characters, multiple subplots and unseemly circumstances accepted as mere routine encounters, it's the truth conveyed within the sardonic narrative that readers relate to most. Hank's colorful running commentary about his various personal and institutional vexations lends American middle-age its due; and while you kind of sense that everything will turn out OK, that pitted feeling of life restrained by obligations is clearly identified. Though at times a bit rambling, the book is lightearted and entertaining and will connect with readers well-associated with the characteristics of a midlife crisis.