One for My Baby: A Novel - Softcover

Parsons, Tony

3.47

3,437 ratings by Goodreads

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0743236092 ISBN 13: 9780743236096

Publisher: Simon and Schuster, 2005

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From the bestselling author of Man and Boy and Man and Wife comes the charming story of a widower who doesn't believe you get a second chance at love. Full of biting social commentary and overwhelming emotion, One for My Baby is a warm and witty novel of love, family, sex, and Tai Chi. Returning to London from Hong Kong after a brief, idyllic marriage ends in tragedy, Alfie Budd finds his world collapsing. Believing his chance for love has passed, he takes comfort in fleeting affairs with his students at Churchill's Language School while watching his parents' marriage, his grandmother's health, and his career ambitions rapidly deteriorate. But then Alfie meets two people who help him to start healing: the old Chinese man he sees practicing Tai Chi in the park every morning and a single mother who needs Alfie's help in completing her education. Soon, our bereft widower is learning much more than Tai Chi and falling for one student above all others. But can Alfie give up meaningless sex for a meaningful relationship? And how much room in our hearts do we really have for love?

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Review:

In One for My Baby Hong-Kong-based language teacher Alfie Budd is about to ingest several gallons of the stuff. Returning to London to nurse a broken heart, he finds a world he barely recognises. Terry Wogan plays REM on Radio Two, there are Tai Chi classes on Highbury Fields and the England of Alfie's youth seems a distant dream. Alfie's father is now sporting disco gear and pitifully clinging onto his relationship with a Czech au pair half his age. Alfie's mother, meanwhile, cares a great deal about her rose bushes and not at all about getting her husband back.

Dazed by these changes, Alfie drifts--on a cloud of Tsingtao beer and Sinatra-fuelled reverie--into a new teaching job and into a string of pointless affairs with his students. But a man can only drift for so long before he starts to sink--and Alfie must learn some bitter lessons before he can regain the happiness he once knew in Hong Kong.

Tony Parsons' second novel deserves to match the phenomenal success of his first, Man and Boy--although there are reasons why it might not. One for My Baby lacks the cutesy appeal of single fathers bringing up sons and some readers may find it--with its double portion of deaths and mid-life depressions--a more demanding read altogether. The book deals with tough realities, with people who have ceased to love themselves and each other, with snobbery and prejudice and the acute loneliness of city life. But the tale is redeemed, ultimately, because humour and warmth pervade even its darkest corners. The laughable antics of Alfie's father are balanced beautifully by George Chang, Alfie's serene and dignified Tai Chi instructor. And while our hero's journey is an arduous one, we are invited to laugh with and at him and never to pity him. Mr Parsons deserves praise for creating a book that is not merely different to his first but also bigger, tougher and cleverer. --Matthew Baylis

Review:

Neil O'Sullivan "Financial Times" (UK) Heartbreakingly universal and full of killer lines on love and love lost.

"Evening Standard" (UK) Another brilliant novel that combines laughter and tears, love and sex -- and real human emotions.

"Observer" (UK) The same combination of self-deprecating humour and well-intentioned bafflement that endeared "Man and Boy" to millions of readers...A kind, warm, affectionate book.

"Mirror" (UK) Stylish, polished, complex and it really gets its teeth into the big issues of sex, love, family and friendship.

"Daily Mail" (UK) Tony Parsons'...novel is full of wit and piercingly sharp observations, but is written with such warmth and humour that, like Alfie, you will find it impossible not to become immersed in and touched by this story of love, sex, tragedy and redemption.

"Another winner."
--"Booklist"
"Heartbreakingly universal and full of killer lines on love and love loss."
-- "Financial Times" (UK)

"Refreshing...Parsons spins a nicely written tale [that] will have readers pondering the complexities of modern families."
-- "Star-Telegram" (Fort Worth, TX)

"You will find it impossible not to become immersed in and touched by this story of love, sex, tragedy, and redemption."
-- "Daily Mail" (UK)

"Another winner."
--"Booklist"

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