Joshua Then and Now

Joshua Shapiro, successful writer and pundit, lying in a hospital room, seems to have lost his wife and is in the middle of a sex scandal.

His upbringing was unusual because his father was a boxer who had become a gentle crook and his mother was a strip-tease dancer.

In England in a momentary lapse of reason, Joshua forges letters about a (fake) homosexual affair with a British writer to sell to an American university archive.

Joshua's conceited brother-in-law assumes a pivotal role in the novel as it is revealed that he is insecure and vulnerable.

Neighbors in the wealthy cottage community around Lake Memphremagog lead him astray with dreadful consequences.