Shy
One of The New Yorker’s Best Books of 2023
In a dilapidated mansion, in the middle of the night, a young man is considering what could be his final decision in this world.
The rucksack is shockingly heavy.
The floorboards complain.
He checks again, the spliff is diagonal-snug in the empty Embassy box.
The daytime check is a half-dream away.
The room is molten soft. Tempting.
Jumpy.
The rucksack is shockingly heavy.
It’s 3:13 a.m.
Shy. A troubled teen, a "dangerous young man," a reject from the social structures that no longer wish to nurture him. Shy knows that society has not failed him, he has failed it—parents, schooling, friends and sometime girlfriends. Judged and found wanting, he now lives at Last Chance, a boarding school for boys like him.
Set over a few hours of a single evening, Shy exists between the stillness and beauty of a nocturne and the exhilarating shout of simultaneous teenage joy and anguish. With leaps of linguistic brilliance and wild energy, this is an utterly immersive novel in its authenticity and heart-breaking honesty. As with all Porter’s writing, the darkness is indivisible from a core of humour and humanity. It is his greatest feat of empathy yet.
In a dilapidated mansion, in the middle of the night, a young man is considering what could be his final decision in this world.
The rucksack is shockingly heavy.
The floorboards complain.
He checks again, the spliff is diagonal-snug in the empty Embassy box.
The daytime check is a half-dream away.
The room is molten soft. Tempting.
Jumpy.
The rucksack is shockingly heavy.
It’s 3:13 a.m.
Shy. A troubled teen, a "dangerous young man," a reject from the social structures that no longer wish to nurture him. Shy knows that society has not failed him, he has failed it—parents, schooling, friends and sometime girlfriends. Judged and found wanting, he now lives at Last Chance, a boarding school for boys like him.
Set over a few hours of a single evening, Shy exists between the stillness and beauty of a nocturne and the exhilarating shout of simultaneous teenage joy and anguish. With leaps of linguistic brilliance and wild energy, this is an utterly immersive novel in its authenticity and heart-breaking honesty. As with all Porter’s writing, the darkness is indivisible from a core of humour and humanity. It is his greatest feat of empathy yet.
