Willing: A Novel
3/5
()
Currently unavailable
Currently unavailable
About this ebook
Thirty-seven-year-old freelance writer Avery Jankowsky is devastated when his girlfriend, Deirdre, confesses that she has been having an affair. Beside himself with jealousy and grief, Avery accepts his uncle Ezra's advice—and his tickets to an all-expenses-paid international sex tour. Sensing a white-hot book idea (and a chance to get back at faithless Deirdre), Avery joins a group of mostly wealthy and accomplished travelers on a mad Nordic whirl, descending ever deeper into a world that is equal parts hilarity and nightmare.
From two-time National Book Award finalist Scott Spencer comes a startling tour de force that explores the limits of male restraint, the intoxications of privilege, and the maddening dangers of freedom.
Scott Spencer
Scott Spencer is the author of twelve novels, including Endless Love,Waking the Dead, A Ship Made of Paper, and Willing. He has taught at Columbia University, the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, Williams College, the University of Virginia, and at Eastern Correctional Facility as part of the Bard Prison Initiative. He lives in upstate New York.
Read more from Scott Spencer
Waking the Dead Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Man in the Woods: A Novel Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Endless Love Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5River Under the Road: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5ZBrush Digital Sculpting Human Anatomy Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Men in Black Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Last Night at the Brain Thieves Ball Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Secret Anniversaries Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPreservation Hall Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Rich Man's Table Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsZBrush Creature Design: Creating Dynamic Concept Imagery for Film and Games Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Related to Willing
Related ebooks
After Gregory Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPrivate Views Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Constance: A Novel Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Believe Me, It's You (The Love Songs Trilogy Book One) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Confessions with Keith Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsNine Nails Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLayover Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Four Square Jane Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsHouse of Mirth Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Slippage: A Novel Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Double Negative Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Forest of Fortune Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5For the Time Being: Collected Journalism Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5In the Rooms: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Bonnie Hearn Hill Boxed Set Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsIn a Yellow Wood Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsRetribution: Stories Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5TOO EASY Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsHe Got Hungry and Forgot His Manners: A Fable Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Bigfoot Dreams: A Novel Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Albert Finney: A Well-Seasoned Life Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Love All: A Novel Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5SEX for FUN Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsPowdered Eggs: A Novel Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5Difficult People Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsLunar Follies Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Droll Tales Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Nowhere: A Novel Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Tempest-Tossed: The Spirit of Isabella Beecher Hooker Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Man Who Loved His Wife Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Psychological Fiction For You
A Certain Hunger Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Lies I Tell: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Grapes of Wrath Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Crime and Punishment Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Last Flight: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Tropic of Cancer Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5My Dark Vanessa: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Trial Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Life of Pi: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Don Quixote Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5Notes on an Execution: An Edgar Award Winner Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Sour Candy Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Persuasion Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Missing Husband: A Tense Psychological Suspense Full of Twists Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5We Have Always Lived in the Castle Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5You: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Good Daughter: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Life She Was Given: A Moving and Emotional Saga of Family and Resilient Women Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Yellow Wallpaper Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Our Town: A Play in Three Acts Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Wuthering Heights Complete Text with Extras Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Golden Notebook: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Poisonwood Bible: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The End Of Alice Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Misery Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Clown Brigade Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Elegance of the Hedgehog Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A History of Wild Places: A Novel Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Housemaid Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for Willing
27 ratings3 reviews
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5“No one really expects you to get your life on firmer footing while you're on a sex tour.” — Scott Spencer, “Willing”If there's one thing worse than being on a sex tour you don't really want to be on, it's meeting your mother along the way. And so we have the situation in Scott Spencer's 2008 novel “Willing.”Avery Jankowsky (his fourth surname because he has had four fathers) is a frustrated freelance writer looking for a big idea to fatten his shrinking bank account. Then Deirdre, his girlfriend, reveals she has been unfaithful. So when his uncle offers him a spot, free of charge, on a sex tour featuring high-class European call girls, he views it as the gold mine he has been looking for, as well as perhaps a way to get back at Deirdre.Off he goes with an assembly of wealthy men, trying to conduct interviews without anyone realizing that is what he is doing. Stops include Iceland, Norway and Latvia. The girls, while interesting, don't help him forget Deirdre. But why does he keep seeing his mother at every hotel?This sounds like it should be a comic novel, and it certainly has comic elements. Deirdre is a student of Russian history, and she tells Avery she thought an affair with a Russian man might be useful research. And Spencer gives us phrases like "Scarlet A Bomb" and "I knew where the caged bird craps." Still this is serious stuff, and Spencer writes beautifully about the neediness of those who seem to have everything, about the boundlessness of a mother's love and about the power of grace.It turns out meeting one's mother on a sex tour might not be such a bad thing after all, not if it puts one's life on firmer footing.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Scott Spencer is a great writer, but 'Willing' is just a good book. This book has such promise, a guy flees a failing relationship plagued by deceit and infidelity by taking his uncle up on an offer for a once in a life time first class sex tour around the world. The lead character grapples with his feelings and emotions as he travels on this tour. At times its profound, and then it can turn almost maddening. The book gathers some great steam only to fail completely in the final act.Spencer has one of the best endings I've read in his book "Men in Black", but here he has a deus ex machina event that just doesn't work and ultimately denigrates a fairly strong effort. In many ways Willing is an incomplete book with a whiplash ending. Spencer is better than this and so that's what makes reading this book all the more frustration. As I've said with other great writers and books that have missed their mark... What happened to the editor? The book was released by Harper Collins, not too shabby of a publisher, and yet no one saw that the gem of this book gets cracked by a truly awful ending?
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Willing's narrator Avery Jankowsky, having just broken up with his unfaithful girlfriend yet still unable to afford to move out of the Manhattan apartment he shares with her, finds himself in the grip of a severe mid-life crisis. This and the promise of a significant book deal that will enable to him not only to move to a new place but also enjoy financial security for the first time in a long while prompt him to embark on an international sex tour offered to him by a well-meaning uncle. What follows is a penetrating and often amusing look into upscale sex tourism at the hands of a narrator who has always been a "good guy" but is at a loss as to whether he wants to continue in that path. In less capable hands, this could prove to be a particularly loathesome topic, but Spencer imbues his narrator with sharp wit and self-awareness and gives him ample time to muse over the immorality into which he has plunged himself. Somehow Spencer's account manages to deride sex tourism while at the same time cultivating readers' sympathies toward the cast of characters who have paid an ample amount of money to participate in the tour, picking up on the somewhat pathetic nature of the entire process.