This is an auction for THE SHORT HISTORY OF A PRINCE by Jane Hamilton.

“Funny, complicated Walter McCloud is at the heart of this quiet interior novel, which gracefully wanders back and forth between two decades - Walter's early 1970s sophomore year in high school and his late 1990s stint as a small-town Midwest high school teacher. As Hamilton has shown in Map of the World, no one writes better of the abyss that cracks apart family members facing the loss of a child. As Walter's 18-year-old brother, Daniel, lies dying of cancer during much of the 1972-73 school year, Walter comes to grips with his own homosexuality and the inaccessibility of his parents, who are swallowed up in their grief. Walter's pivotal friendships with the beautiful Susan and Mitch, the boy they both love, sustains, shatters, and alters his sense of self as he stumbles toward adulthood. Hamilton's forte - depicting adolescents left not by villainy but by circumstance on the fringes of family life while they figure out ways to raise themselves - is at its most painful clarity in this novel. Highly recommended.”

• Library Journal (US)

Very favourable reviews on Amazon.com.

Hardback 1998.

349 pages.

Very good condition.

The cost of shipping is $4.95 (ordinary post) or $5.95 (tracked mail). If you are on rural delivery and want tracked mail, the shipping cost will be $8.95.

There is of course no charge for shipping if you collect this book from my shop in Palmerston North following the auction.

Payment within seven days, please.