The Honeymoon - Man Booker Longlist!

by Justin Haythe.
Grove Atlantic
Elaine Markson Literary Agency

Longlisted for 2004 Man Booker Prize

Rights sold to:
Uk – Picador 2004

In his debut novel, The Honeymoon, Haythe delivers a deeply observant and nuanced tale, set in London and Venice at the end of the twentieth century, in which a young man looks back on a series of events that have caused his life to unravel. Until the age of twenty-one, American-born Gordon Garrety hasn’t reflected much on his unusual and peripatetic childhood, spent largely as the traveling companion of his eccentric mother, Maureen. Only when Gordon meets Annie, several years his senior, does he begin to emerge from the sphere of his mother’s influence. The first time they meet, Gordon and Annie make love in a park and soon after are married. Over the course of a year in London, Gordon and Annie construct for themselves an idea of married life, into which Maureen’s restless spirit occasionally intrudes. Accompanied by Maureen and her bibulous Swiss fiance, Gerhardt, Annie and Gordon finally take their long-delayed honeymoon to Venice, where they are instantly seduced by the world’s most unlikely city. Beautifully crafted, gently funny, and genuinely surprising, Justin Haythe’s remarkably assured debut will astound readers with its dead-on depiction of the dangers of desultory and privileged lives.

After growing up in London, Haythe received his M.F.A. in fiction from Sarah Lawrence, and has since published his fiction in Harper’s Magazine. He also writes for film (represented by CAA), and is an associate Editor at Fence magazine. His first novel tells the story of twenty-one-year old protagonist Gordon Garrety, who reflects on his unusual and peripatetic childhood, spent largely as the travelling companion of his eccentric mother, Maureen. A self-proclaimed art historian, she has devoted her life to travelling around Europe in order to write a Guide to Great Art--the sort that was written by society ladies in another era, and which she hopes will relieve the widespread phenomenon of “ignorant tourism”-- not to mention the indignities of modern, budget travel. That she is living entirely off Gordon’s father (whom she left long ago), or that her travels take place during the 1970’s and 80’s, when such a book could be considered hopelessly out of date, is no matter. Only when Gordon meets and marries his first love, Annie, a woman several years his senior, does he begin to crawl out from under the shadow of his mother--until, that is, he allows her to accompany them, with an odd new companion of her own, on a honeymoon to Venice. As this bizarre adventure unfolds, the doomed double date results in an inevitable collision between mother and wife, forcing Gordon to confront what remains hollow at his own core. With no nationality, no fixed social standing, and no firm opinions, what emerges is Gordon’s fear, as he struggles to embrace adulthood, of failing his mother, his wife, and ultimately, himself. (*Two-book deal)

At age twenty-one, protagonist Gordon Garrety reflects on his unusual and peripatetic childhood, spent largely as the travelling companion of his eccentric mother, Maureen. A self-proclaimed art historian, she has
devoted her life to travelling around Europe in order to write a Guide to Great Art--the sort that was written by society ladies in another era, and which she hopes will relieve the widespread phenomenon of "ignorant tourism"-- not to mention the indignities of modern, budget travel. That she is living entirely off Gordon’s father (whom she left long ago), or that her travels take place during the 1970’s and 80’s, when such a book could be considered hopelessly out of date, is no matter.

Only when Gordon meets and marries his first love, Annie, a woman several years his senior, does he begin to crawl out from under the shadow of his mother--until, that is, he allows her to accompany them, with an odd new companion of her own, on a honeymoon to Venice. As this bizarre adventure unfolds, the doomed double date results in an inevitable collision between mother and wife, forcing Gordon to confront what remains hollow at his own core. With no nationality, no fixed social standing, and no firm opinions, what emerges is Gordon’s fear, as he struggles to embrace adulthood, of failing his mother, his wife, and ultimately, himself.

Justin is a deeply observant and nuanced writer with a gifted imagination. Reading this story, you might as well be touching, hearing, smelling, and tasting Venice. In my opinion, THE HONEYMOON not only illustrates Justin’s talent as a classic storyteller, but in the spirit of J.D.Salinger or Walker Percy, this book explores what it means to feel marginalized by society--regardless of financial or social status.


Justin grew up in London, studied at Middlebury College, and recently received his M.F.A. in fiction from Sarah Lawrence. The very first short story I sent out on his behalf, "The Fabulous Wardrobe of Mrs. Pat
Campbell," was published in Harper’s last year. I must also mention that at the tender age of 28, he is already making waves in Hollywood as a successful screenwriter (represented by CAA) whose very first screenplay, "The Clearing" was just produced and filmed last month by Robert Redford, starring Redford, Willem Dafoe and Helen Mirren. Justin is also currently under contract with Dreamworks to write Sam Mendes’ next film.

Reviews:
From Publishers Weekly
The bond between mother and son becomes a stranglehold in Haythe’s debut novel, an elaborate, unsettling character study that uses Venice as the setting for a strange honeymoon. Shy, sheltered Gordon Garraty spends most of his childhood traveling with his eccentric mother, Maureen, a dilettante who is constantly hopping around Europe to work on an art guide book that remains in a perpetual state of near-completion. Maureen’s flamboyant dominance of her son leaves Gordon a bit of a blank slate, until he heads off to college in London and meets a sly, coy waitress named Annie who inexplicably breaks off her engagement to another man and agrees to marry Gordon after a disturbingly brief courtship. The unlikely union seems to surprise both bride and groom, and Gordon’s rather tepid relationship with Annie comes completely unraveled when Maureen and her new fiancé, the over-tanned Gerhardt, invite the newlyweds on a trip to Venice. Haythe’s prose is smooth and probing, and the narrative stakes rise when Annie hints at the possibility of incest between Maureen and Gordon after deciding to leave Venice early. But Haythe’s focus on Maureen makes Gordon a shadowy, incomplete figure, and the novel’s conclusion is more bizarre than climactic. Haythe shows promise as a stylist, but the combination of muddled climax and uneven character development hinders this otherwise impressive debut.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
Gordon Garrety is an American living in London. He spent his childhood traveling about Europe with his mother, whom he always calls Maureen as she constructs a kind of grand tour of Europe out of her own notes and responses to art. The story spins backward as we learn about Gordon’s father; his wife, Annie; and how bereft he is in his current life. It is Maureen who fills these pages, her "lilting flirtatiousness, the mock casualness, the wholly unjustified tone of expertise." It is Maureen who brings Annie and Gordon to Venice with her own new fiance on a belated honeymoon, and it is Maureen who threatens, in a spectacularly small-minded way, any hope Gordon may have at happiness. The writing is shapely and crafted; the characters glow, except for Gordon, which may be the point. GraceAnne DeCandido
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

LOS ANGELES TIMES BOOK REVIEW, May 16, 2004

THE HONEYMOON by Justin Haythe

“It is a city inhabited almost entirely by tourists and there is something fraudulent to its old-world ways.” The city is Venice, the gilded setting for the second half of this exquisite emotional gothic from Justin Haythe, and the above observation comes from Gordon Garrety, Haythe’s worldly wise, 21-year-old narrator.

Like Gordon with his suspicions about Venice, “The Honeymoon” looks askance upon the beautiful and splendid, plumbing the stilted emotional depths of two wayward Americans who appear to have arrived via Henry James into the late 1980s—Gordon and his mother, Maureen. Beauty itself mediates their every life decision: Maureen has been working (for decades, it seems) on an art connoisseur’s guide to Europe, and the two of them crisscross the Continent like a pair of Grand Touring vagabonds, guided by Maureen’s latest aesthetical whims and the long suffering generosity of Theo, Gordon’s wealthy father.

For nouveaux riches, they live like old-school Stranded Gentry: “I grew up with the trappings of money,” Gordon tells us, “(if often without money itself).” Instead of dollars and cents, they have the National Portrait Gallery and an extremely weird codependency.

What develops, when Gordon stumbles into a premature marriage with the daughter of a London cabbie, is a recasting of Ian McEwan’s disquieting ode to creepy Venice, “The Comfort of Strangers,” complete with requisite unexpected bloodshed. But “The Honeymoon” isn’t a mere retread. It’s awfully close to being a peer: a sophisticated take on all the big stuff (love, class, death, Bellinis) whose evanescent prose shimmers like mist off the Grand Canal.

On the crest of a wave
By Rebecca Matthews

Talented young writer Justin Haythe has the world at his feet. First screenplay, The Clearing, is released in May. Now working with Sam Mendes, Justin shares his insight into writing success


How long were you writing before you achieved recognition in the industry? Did you meet many rejections?
‘I began writing seriously when I was in college/university at Middlebury College in Vermont. I studied English Literature and wrote a novel as a senior thesis. I found very little encouragement from the official creative writing professors but found a serious and highly critical reader in a literature professor, a Jamesian scholar. He was the first to encourage me in my writing and I am indebted to him.
With that first and not very good book, I moved to New York City where I met a young woman in publishing. She thought there was promise in the writing and got in touch after she had become an agent. She showed that first book around to publishers where it was quite rightly rejected. It now resides in a drawer never to be seen again.
A few years later in a thrilling moment of good-fortune, she sold the first story we submitted to Harper’s Magazine. I was already in the process of writing The Honeymoon and had begun writing scripts. Upon the book’s completion, she sold The Honeymoon to Picador in London and then to Grove Atlantic here in New York.’

What do you consider to be your greatest difficulties as an aspiring writer? How did you overcome them?
‘The greatest difficulty is writing well. I know this sounds obvious, but it is so difficult. I am very fortunate to have discipline ingrained in me. Perhaps I owe my hard-working parents.
Discipline is a gift, I think, because all the anxiety that comes with writing can be put into the work. I realized that I could not control how good I was, or how good other people would think I was, but I could control how hard I worked so I endeavoured to work very hard.
I tried to write even when I was uninspired if, for no other reason, but to work at the craft of it. To become a better writer. One of the great pleasures is to realize after years that I am a better writer than I was back then.’

How long did it take to complete ’The Honeymoon’?
‘A complicated answer. I began the Honeymoon in 1997 when I was at a Graduate program at Sarah Lawrence College here in New York. I remain ambivalent about the experience except that I met some very good readers and that has been invaluable. I worked at it for two years there and then began to work in the film business.
I worked on the book intermittently as I wrote the script for The Clearing and another script for a small Los Angeles production company. I completed my last edit with my editor in London in November 2002. There was subsequent work with a copy editor and then another pass was made when my editor moved from Penguin to Picador and now it’s 2004!’

You are quoted as saying that Pieter Jan Brugge, producer of The Clearing, allowed you to ’approach the script in some of the ways I approach fiction writing.’ Did you encounter any particular difficulties in making the leap from fiction to screenplay?
‘No particular difficulties. There were technical lessons to learn about the new language. I continue to learn about the different disciplines.
I recently adapted Richard Yates’s Revolutionary Road and that was enormously instructive. What I realized is that I knew a great deal about the way movies worked from just growing up in a house where movies were watched with regularity.
Many people claim that writing scripts can ruin your fiction writing, but I have not found that to be the case. Sometimes, I approach writing scripts as a writing exercise, a riddle. In a limited amount of time, with a limited amount of objects, of details, a point has to be made, a change has to occur.
I think that short stories and film scripts have perhaps the most in common. The task is to quickly arrange characters in place, where they stand in the world or in regards to each other and then to make something happen that shakes that.’

You said that ’The Clearing’ ’has the engine of a thriller, but it’s really about the people’. Would you say that all your work, whether fiction or screenplay, is essentially character-driven?
‘Yes I think so. Recently, it was put to me that character is fate. This is a really nice way to think of it. An event, an action, a plot is believable if it comes from a true character. One is not left wondering, would he or she really do that?
I think that even action-driven plots are most interesting when they come out of character. Their character makes what befalls them somehow inevitable.’

Have you developed a preference for either fiction or screenwriting? Would you like to pursue both forms in the future?
‘I would like to pursue both forms. I enjoy the collaborative, practical nature of screenwriting and I love movies. Fiction writing remains the greater passion, however.’

Can you offer any advice to aspiring writers?
‘On a craft level, perhaps I would say beware of the moments when the writer, rather than the story is on the page, but that may be just a question of taste.’