Jonathan Tropper Books In Order

Plan B

Turning thirty was never supposed to be like this. Ten years ago, Ben, Lindsey, Chuck, Alison, and Jack graduated from New York University and went out into the world, fresh faced and full of dreams for the future. But now Ben’s getting a divorce; Lindsey’s unemployed; Alison and Chuck seem stuck in ruts of their own making; and Jack is getting more publicity for his cocaine addiction than his multimillion dollar Hollywood successes. Suddenly, turning thirty past the age their parents were when they were born, older than every current star athlete or pop music sensation seems to be both more meaningful and less than they’d imagined ten years ago. Jonathan Tropper’s wonderful debut novel is about more than friendship, love, celebrity, addiction, kidnapping, or even turning thirty it’s a heartfelt comic riff on what it means to be an adult against your will, to be single when you thought you’d have a family, to discover you are not, in fact, immortal, and to learn that Star Wars is as good a life lesson today as it was when you were six years old.

The Book of Joe / Bush Falls

Right after high school, Joe Goffman left sleepy Bush Falls, Connecticut and never looked back. Then he wrote a novel savaging everything in town, a novel that became a national bestseller and a huge hit movie. Fifteen years later, Joe is struggling to avoid the sophomore slump with his next novel when he gets a call: his father’s had a stroke, so it’s back to Bush Falls for the town’s most famous pariah. His brother avoids him, his former classmates beat him up, and the members of the book club just hurl their copies of Bush Falls at his house. But with the help of some old friends, Joe discovers that coming home isn’t all bad and that maybe the best things in life are second chances.

Fans of Nick Horn*y and Jennifer Weiner will love this book, by turns howling funny, fiercely intelligent, and achingly poignant. As evidenced by The Book of Joe’s success in both the foreign and movie markets, Jonathan Tropper has created a compelling, incredibly resonant story.

From the Hardcover edition.

Everything Changes

Jonathan Tropper’s novel The Book of Joe dazzled critics and readers alike with its heartfelt blend of humor and pathos. Now Tropper brings all that and more to an irresistible new novel. In Everything Changes, Tropper delivers a touching, wickedly funny new tale about love, loss, and the perils of a well planned life. Everything Changes To all appearances, Zachary King is a man with luck on his side. A steady, well paying job, a rent free Manhattan apartment, and Hope, his stunning, blue blooded fianc e: smart, sexy, and completely out of his league. But as the wedding day looms, Zack finds himself haunted by the memory of his best friend, Rael, killed in a car wreck two years earlier and by his increasingly complicated feelings for Tamara, the beautiful widow Rael left behind. Then Norm Zack s freewheeling, Via*gra popping father resurfaces after a twenty year absence, looking to make amends. Norm s overbearing, often outrageous efforts to reestablish ties with his sons infuriate Zack, and yet, despite twenty years of bad blood, he finds something compelling in his father s maniacal determination to transform his own life. Inspired by Norm, Zack boldly attempts to make some changes of his own, and the results are instantly calamitous. Soon fists are flying, his love life is a shambles, and his once carefully structured existence is spinning hopelessly out of control. Charged with intelligence and razor sharp wit, Everything Changes is at once hilarious, moving, sexy, and wise a work of transcendent storytelling from an exciting new talent. From the Hardcover edition.

How to Talk to a Widower

‘Beautifully crafted’, ‘Fantastically funny.’ ‘Compulsively readable.’ Jonathan Tropper has earned wild acclaim and comparisons to Nick Hornby and Tom Perrotta for his biting humor and insightful portrayals of families in crisis and men behaving badly. Now the acclaimed author of The Book of Joe and Everything Changes tackles love, lust, and lost in the suburbs in a stunning novel that is by turns heartfelt and riotously funny. Doug Parker is a widower at age twenty nine, and in his quiet suburban town, that makes him something of a celebrity the object of sympathy, curiosity, and, in some cases, unbridled desire. But Doug has other things on his mind. First there’s his sixteen year old stepson, Russ: a once sweet kid who now is getting into increasingly serious trouble on a daily basis. Then there are Doug’s sisters: his bossy twin, Clair, who’s just left he husband and moved in with Doug, determined to rouse him from his Grieving stupor. And Debbie, who’s engaged to Doug’s ex best friend and manically determined to pull off the perfect wedding at any cost. Soon Doug’s entire nuclear family is in his face. And when he starts dipping his toes into the shark infested waters of the second time around dating scene, it isn’t long before his new life is spinning hopelessly out of control, cutting a harrowing and often hilarious swath of sexual missteps and escalating chaos across the suburban landscape. From the Hardcover edition.

This is Where I Leave You

The death of Judd Foxman’s father marks the first time that the entire Foxman family including Judd’s mother, brothers, and sister have been together in years. Conspicuously absent: Judd’s wife, Jen, whose fourteen month affair with Judd’s radio shock jock boss has recently become painfully public. Simultaneously mourning the death of his father and the demise of his marriage, Judd joins the rest of the Foxmans as they reluctantly submit to their patriarch’s dying request: to spend the seven days following the funeral together. In the same house. Like a family. As the week quickly spins out of control, longstanding grudges resurface, secrets are revealed, and old passions reawakened. For Judd, it’s a weeklong attempt to make sense of the mess his life has become while trying in vain not to get sucked into the regressive battles of his madly dysfunctional family. All of which would be hard enough without the bomb Jen dropped the day Judd’s father died: She’s pregnant. This is Where I Leave You is Jonathan Tropper’s most accomplished work to date, a riotously funny, emotionally raw novel about love, marriage, divorce, family, and the ties that bind whether we like it or not.