September 26, 2016
Set amid the 2008 financial collapse, Pitoniak’s assured debut explores the cost of realizing—and misinterpreting—one’s dreams. Evan Peck, the son of grocery-store owners in remote British Columbia, needs student loans and a hockey scholarship to afford the Ivy League, while Julia Edwards hails from Northeastern privilege. Meeting at Yale, they fall promptly in love despite their different upbringings. Upon graduation, Evan lands a plum job at a Manhattan hedge fund fighting to survive the deepening Wall Street meltdown, as Julia, unsure of her calling, settles for a low-level job at small nonprofit. Soon, the couple seems to share little more than their cramped apartment. An exhausted Evan worries when the deal he’s working on turns out to have a shady underside; Julia finds in a charismatic journalist the sense of promise that neither work nor Evan gives her. As the distance between them leads to betrayal, they must face the ways they have sabotaged each other and themselves. Navigating terrain—love and youth, college and city life—that’s often oversimplified, Pitoniak eschews cliché for nuanced characterization and sharply observed detail. Evan and Julia ring true as 20-somethings, but Pitoniak’s novel also speaks to anyone who has searched among possible futures for the way back to what Julia calls “the person I had been all along.”
October 1, 2016
Julia, who comes from a wealthy family, has an art degree and no vision for her life beyond college. Evan is a Canadian hockey player from a working-class family. He, however, has a plan. His degree in finance lands him a job at a prestigious hedge fund in New York City. After meeting at Yale, Evan and Julia move to New York together, each struggling to establish a career. As they become immersed in their own interests, they grow apart. When the financial world crumbles, an ironic twist causes Evan to lose his job and destroys his faltering relationship with Julia. VERDICT This debut coming-of-age novel captures the insecurities of the first days of independent adulthood and the unintended consequences in the struggle for maturity. Readers of general fiction will enjoy this story. Recommended. [See Prepub Alert, 7/11/16.]--Joanna Burkhardt, Univ. of Rhode Island Libs., Providence
Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
August 1, 2016
Having met at Yale, small-town Canadian Evan and upper-crust Julia move together to New York. Julia is still trying to figure things out when Evan's involvement with a risky deal brings his hedge fund career crashing down. Lots of industry buzz; with a 35,000-copy first printing.
Copyright 2016 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
October 15, 2016
Once young and in love and destined for greatness, a pair of recent college grads find themselves dangerously unraveling at the dawn of the 2008 financial crisis in Pitoniak's energetic debut.Julia Edwards and Evan Peck fall in love freshman year at Yale. He's a small-town boy from rural Canada at Yale on a hockey scholarship; she's a gorgeous prep-school grad from suburban Boston at Yale because that's where people like her are destined to be. After four (mostly) blissful years of undergrad, the pair moves to New York City, sharing an apartment on the Upper East Side. But almost immediately, the relationship begins to show cracks. Evan is working round the clock as a first-year associate at an ultraprestigious hedge fund; Julia's floundering, the only one of her friends to graduate wholly without a path. Eventually, through family connections, she gets an assistant position at an arts nonprofit, the main advantage of which is that it is better than nothing. As the markets continue to tank, Julia and Evan drift further and further apart, each of them consumed by a different, sinister game. Evan is tapped to work on a top-secret deal that may not be exactly what it seems, while Julia reconnects with a rakish college pal who seems to offer her access to the life she'd always imagined. Though their paths have catastrophically diverged, both Julia and Evan are facing versions of the same all-too-recognizable post-collegiate crisis: what happens when you aren't the person you thought you were? Pitoniak expertly captures both the excitement and the oppressive darkness of being young and at sea in New York City, the unsettlingly thin line between freedom and free fall. And while the novel isn't always subtle in its revelations, it's deeply empathetic--and always engaging. A bittersweet coming-of-age drama and a portrait of an era.
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October 15, 2016
Recent college grads Julia and Evan, who alternate chapters narrating Pitoniak's debut, have just traded New Haven for New York. Without any distinct post-college plans, Julia thinks moving in with Evan is as good as anything else. Evan, on the other hand, has landed a coveted spot at a highly respected hedge fund, one of the few, he'll soon learn, that's safe in the about-to-happen 2008 market crash. Quickly, Evan is working around the clock, attracting the attention of a boss whose elusive praise is wildly sought-after by his competitive colleagues. Julia, working only normal hours, is lonely and disappointed, if not surprised, by how quickly playing house has become anything but fun. When Evan gets involved in a deal that he suspects, then knows, isn't above-board, and Julia seeks fun and comfort elsewhere, Pitoniak keeps the pace moving at a steady clip. Through Julia, preppy, privileged, depressive, and Evan, a Canadian country boy running from his roots, Pitoniak's well plotted, character-driven, interior-focused novel captures the knowable angst of the unknowable possibilities of modern young adulthood.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2016, American Library Association.)