Christodora

A novel of great scope and ambition, Christodora is a bold and poignant portrait of the bohemian Manhattan of sex, drugs, art, and activism, from the early 1980s into the near future. `This novel is your next must-read. Set in and around the iconic building in the East Village from which the book takes its title, it’s a captivating, multi-stranded New York epic about the AIDS crisis. Beginning in the 1980s and spanning four decades, Christodora follows the lives of the victims and heroes of the darkest of these years . . . An engrossing and inspiring story of loss, love and hope, set against a backdrop of art, activism and addiction.’ Observer `New York’s East Village is the setting for this brilliantly kaleidoscopic story about the city’s haves and have-nots, both brought together and torn apart by an epidemic . . . This sprawling, seething, sumptuous tale of the city’s haves and have-nots . . . There have been several whopping New York novels in the last couple of years, but none of them possesses Christodora’s generosity, its weathered and unflinching faith in what people can achieve.’ Olivia Laing, Guardian `[A] thrillingly accomplished novel . . . [Its] varied minds and voices are realized so convincingly that Christodora sometimes seems the product of spirit possession. And it is joyous despite its subject matter.’ New York Times `Outstanding . . . Breathtaking . . . Christodora is the most exciting New York novel since Hanya Yanagihara’s A Little Life.’ Attitude `Reminiscent of [Jay] McInerney at his peak, concerning itself with young Manhattanites and their relationships with sex, drugs, psychologists, art and real estate . . . There are sections that are hard to read as they are so filled with anguish . . . There is no denying the quality of the writing and the deep integrity of this novel.’ John Boyne, Irish Times 'An engrossing and inspiring story of loss, love and hope, set against a backdrop of art, activism and addiction.' – Observer Moving from the Tompkins Square Riots and attempts by activists to galvanize a response to the AIDS epidemic, to the New York City of the future, Tim Murphy's Christodora recounts the heartbreak wrought by AIDS, illustrates the allure and destructive power of hard drugs, and brings to life the ever-changing city itself. The Christodora is home to Milly and Jared, a privileged young couple with artistic ambitions. Their neighbour, Hector, a Puerto Rican gay man who was once a celebrated AIDS activist but is now a lonely addict, becomes connected to Milly's and Jared's lives in ways none of them can anticipate. Meanwhile, the couple's adopted son, Mateo, grows to appreciate the opportunities for both self-realization and oblivion that New York offers. As the junkies and protestors of the 1980s give way to the hipsters of the 2000s and they, in turn, to the wealthy residents of the crowded, glass-towered city of the 2020s, enormous changes rock the personal lives of Milly and Jared and the constellation of people around them. 'An impassioned, big-hearted, and ultimately hopeful chronicle of a changing New York that authoritatively evokes the despair and panic in the city at the height of the plague.' – Hanya Yanagihara, author of A Little Life