cover image The Lost Boys Symphony

The Lost Boys Symphony

Mark Andrew Ferguson. Little, Brown, $25 (352p) ISBN 978-0-316-32399-4

Ferguson’s debut novel begins as a coming-of-age story, with its characters in various points of crisis. College student Valerie Mitchell has left Rutgers and her boyfriend, Henry, and moved to Manhattan, transferring to NYU. Henry is so distressed that he decides to follow her. Flashbacks trace their breakup from both their perspectives, as well as Gabe’s, Henry’s roommate, who’s also close to Valerie. Henry and Gabe both struggle with mental and emotional equilibrium, verging close to full-on breakdowns; Henry eventually replaces Gabe with a pair of mysterious, omnipresent confidants identified as 41 and 80. Ferguson’s prose has familiar, often graceful, rhythms; his storytelling is accessible and intelligent, comfortably free of pretension. This story of extreme behaviors has an eerie cast, which is only intensified when the plot ventures into the realm of delusion without any change of voice. Though the plot is soapy and the questions raised about reality are not as effective when Henry addresses them directly, they are nonetheless resonant. (Mar.)