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A hilariously acerbic sliding doors novel about a chance meeting between two young parents, both happily married (just not to each other) that sparks a will-they-won’t-they romance—perfect for fans of Big Swiss and Acts of Service.
When Cora meets Sam at a baby group in their small town, the chemistry between them is undeniable. Both are happily married young parents with two kids, and neither sees themselves as the type to engage in an affair. Yet their connection grows stronger, and as their lives continue to intertwine, the romantic tension between them becomes all-consuming—until their worlds unravel into two parallel timelines. In one, they pursue their feelings. In the other, they resist.
As reality splits, the everyday details of Cora’s life—her depressing marketing job, her daughter’s new fascination with the afterlife, her husband’s obsession with podcasts about the history of rope—gain fresh perspective. The intersecting and diverging timelines blur the boundaries of reality and fantasy, questioning what might have been and what truly matters.
"The Ten Year Affair isn't just the best book about adultery since Madame Bovary; it's also a funny and deeply true novel about the role of the imagination in human existence, those banal longterm daydreams that compete with your life while helping you cope with it. Erin Somers's wit is as cool, caustic, and dry as liquid nitrogen, and her dangerous talent is on full display in this excellent book."
Tony Tulathimutte, author of Rejection
"The Ten Year Affair is a hilarious and acutely observed account of early middle life. Somers writes with warmth, wit, and shimmering insight about the failings and strivings of decent people who wake up and find that life isn’t quite working out. No other writer at work today is as alert to the comedy of everyday life and to the extraordinary realms of feeling that lie behind that comedy. I never wanted this novel to end. I loved every moment. Somers has written a classic of our era."
Brandon Taylor, author of The Late Americans and Filthy Animals
"A compulsively readable, surprising, and wholly satisfying story of the way we long, now. Told with inexhaustible wit, Somers's novel is packed full of observations and flights of imagination so perfect in their particulars that their accumulation becomes luminous."
Julia May Jonas, author of Vladimir
"Smart, sharp, and incredibly funny, Erin Somers' The Ten Year Affair explores the slippery complicated space of fidelity, parenthood, and marriage. How do we continue to choose to love the people we have chosen, to not feel trapped inside those choices? Where and what are we reaching for when we reach outside them, and what is it that makes both staying and leaving so thrilling and so terrifying in equal parts? I loved this book for its deftness, humor, and its remarkable acuity."
Lynn Steger Strong, author of Flight
When June Bloom, an assistant on the late-night comedy show, Stay Up with Hugo Best, runs into Hugo himself at an open mic following his unexpected retirement, she finds herself fielding a surprising invitation: Hugo asks June to come to his mansion in Greenwich for the long Memorial Day weekend. “No funny business,” he insists. “Incisive, funny, and tinged with melancholy, this timely novel follows two lost but clever souls desperate for connection” (Entertainment Weekly).
June, in need of a job and money, but harboring the remains of a childhood crush on the charming older comedian and former role model, is confident she can handle herself. She accepts. As the weekend unfolds and the enigmatic Hugo gradually reveals appealingly vulnerable facets to his personality, their dynamic proves to be much more complicated and less predictable than June imagined.
“A zippy debut…June’s quick wit keeps the banter flowing over a bizarre Memorial Day weekend…the millennial and the magnetic celebrity are surprisingly well suited, two sardonic souls who find themselves connecting…magnificent…a devilishly fun ride.”
Vogue
“Incisive, funny, and tinged with melancholy, the timely novel follows two lost but clever souls desperate for connection.”
Entertainment Weekly
“Taut and incisive... tender... Somers is clear—exquisitely, wrenchingly—when articulating Bloom’s lifelong fixation on Best.”
New York Times Book Review
“On the surface, Somers' debut is light and breezy, but the narrative is deft, controlled, and deadly smart. She mines depths out of Hollywood's propensity to look the other way when beloved men behave badly without a hint of preachiness. Instead, she's interested in complicity... What could be a straightforward novel about a young woman and an older man taking mutual advantage of one another is instead a brilliant study in how rarely we seize opportunities to grow and change for the better—especially if we're lucky enough to get more than one. An outstanding comedic debut about the deeply unfunny trials of growing up in and out of the spotlight. Somers is a writer to watch.”
Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review
"Stay Up With Hugo Best is a book that is also described as 'the perfect read for the #MeToo era,' but that isn’t just a platitude. The novel follows June, a junior staffer at a late-night TV show, who goes home with the much-older host of said show. You may think you know what happens next, but the novel doesn’t follow the sleazy old man plus naive ingenue playbook. It gives the agency to its rightful owner, a young woman stumbling into adulthood who must navigate an awkward weekend with her boss. Praised for its insider details of the world of late-night television, Stay Up With Hugo Best is a witty and subtle commentary on sex, power, and social politics."
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