Summertime
Author: J.M. Coetzee
Publisher: Harvil Secker
Price: $32 (Hardcover)
Nobel prize winner and two-time Booker Prize recipient J.M. Coetzee completes his trilogy of fictionalized memoirs with Summertime. Following in the vein he created in Boyhood and Youth, Coetzee uses his own life experiences to craft the events surrounding a central character based on himself. Summertime picks up in mid-1970s Cape Town, the period an English academic is zeroing in on the deceased John Coetzee’s life. The novel presents interviews with characters in the fictional Coetzee’s life, from the Brazilian dancer mother of one of Coetzee’s students to an intimate former flame, exploring whether anyone should even care about the author in death.
