Tony and Susan
| Author | Austin Wright |
|---|---|
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre | Novel |
| Publisher | Baskerville Publishers, Grand Central Publisher |
|
Publication date
|
1993 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| Pages | 334 pp (first edition, hardback) |
| ISBN |
(first edition, hardback Baskerville); (Grand Central hardback) |
(first edition, hardback Baskerville);
Tony and Susan is a novel by Austin Wright first published in 1993 by Baskerville Publishers, a small press, after having been turned down by 11 major New York publishers. The book was a critical success and went into two editions with sale to Book-of-the-Month Club as "Talk of the Office," and translation into 13 languages. Movie rights were optioned to Universal Studios and later to HBO (though it was never made) and Warner Books took the paperback rights for $400,000 in a two-day auction. Tony and Susan was Warner's lead paperback fiction in September 1994. It was thought at the time that the paperback edition did not sell well because the book was too literary to be a mass-market offering. In 2010, the book was published for the first time in the UK and enjoyed a critical revival causing it to be reprinted in the U.S.
In 2016, the novel was adapted into the film Nocturnal Animals, by director Tom Ford, which was released to positive reception. Following the adaptation, the book was again republished, with a new cover and the updated title of Nocturnal Animals, corresponding with the film's release.
In 1990, Susan Morrow is surprised to hear from her estranged ex-husband, Edward, who sends her a manuscript to his novel, Nocturnal Animals. Susan and Edward's relationship had dissolved 25 years earlier in part thanks to him abandoning his studies to be a lawyer to pursue a writing career and Susan is surprised to find that he is still writing. After putting off the manuscript for months she reads it in the course of three nights after learning that Edward will be passing through her city soon.
Nocturnal Animals is about a meek mathematician named Tony Hastings on his way to his country home in Maine with his wife, Laura, and teenage daughter, Helen. Deciding to drive all night to get to Maine they are accosted by three men in a truck, Ray, Lou, and Turk, who begin blocking the path to their car. The cars end up bumping each other and the leader of the men, Ray, gets in the car with Laura and Helen and drives off with them. Tony is then driven to a clearing and abandoned there. Walking to a farmhouse he manages to call for help and retracing his steps with the state troopers discovers Laura and Helen's naked bodies in the clearing where he had been abandoned. He begins to blame himself for not doing enough to prevent their rapes and murders.
For a year after the murders Tony falls into depression. The lead detective on the case, Bobby Andes, calls him in to identify a possible suspect, but when Tony cannot positively identify a man who turns out to be Turk, Andes seems to lose interest in the case. Sometime after Andes again calls Tony to I.D. a man and this time he is able to identify Lou as one of the men complicit in the murders of his wife and daughter. He learns that all three men had been involved in a robbery and that Turk was shot to death. Andes brings Tony with him to pick up and identify Ray and, after Tony makes a positive I.D., Andes takes them on a trip to the scenes of the crime. Though Ray denies any knowledge of the crime, Tony feels he is mocking him and at one point is overcome with rage and hits him in the face.
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