Overview

"On January 7, 1980, in the run-up to the publication of his landmark bestseller Thy Neighbor's Wife, Gay Talese received an anonymous letter from a man in Colorado. ""Since learning of your long awaited study of coast-to-coast sex in America,"" the letter began, ""I feel I have important information that I could contribute to its contents or to contents of a future book."" The man went on to tell Talese an astonishing secret, that he had bought a motel to satisfy his voyeuristic desires. He had built an attic ""observation platform,"" fitted with vents, through which he could peer down on his unwitting guests. Unsure what to make of this confession, Talese traveled to Colorado where he met the man--Gerald Foos--verified his story in person, and read some of his extensive journals, a secret record of America's changing social and sexual mores. But because Foos insisted on remaining anonymous, Talese filed his reporting away, assuming the story would remain untold. Now, after thirty-five years, he's ready to go public and Talese can finally tell his story. The Voyeur's Motel is an extraordinary work of narrative journalism, and one of the most talked about books of the year."

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9780802125811

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Reviews

Praise for Gay Talese: The most important nonfiction writer of his generation, the person whose work most influenced at least two generations of other reporters. David Halberstam, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and historian He is a reporter, true enough, but one with the eyes and ears of an artist. Los Angeles Times Book Review Talese . . . as he has proven again and again with his books, is a master of the narrative art. William Kennedy, author of Ironweed and Roscoe Talese s . . . prose [is] distinctive for its precision, its silkiness, its attention to important details that lesser journalists routinely overlooked. Alan Moore, author of Watchmen and V for Vendetta In a culture of success and celebrity, Gay Talese has always found his best subjects in failure and decline: Joe DiMaggio in his lonely eclipse; Joshua Logan in the midst of terrible depressions; Floyd Patterson struggling to express what it is to be knocked flat in front of a filled stadium. Talese s lapidary style and impeccable reporting standards have endured far better than the work of some of his more histrionic New Journalism contemporaries. New Yorker

Praise for Gay Talese: The most important nonfiction writer of his generation, the person whose work most influenced at least two generations of other reporters. David Halberstam, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and historian He is a reporter, true enough, but one with the eyes and ears of an artist. Los Angeles Times Book Review The best non-fiction writer in America. Mario Puzo, author of The Godfather Talese . . . as he has proven again and again with his books, is a master of the narrative art. William Kennedy, author of Ironweed and Roscoe Talese s . . . prose [is] distinctive for its precision, its silkiness, its attention to important details that lesser journalists routinely overlooked. Alan Moore, author of Watchmen and V for Vendetta [Talese s] legacy is twofold. First, he is the indefatigable reporter whose books and articles are the product of extensive research. Second, he is the poet of the commonplace, the writer who demonstrated that one could write great literary nonfiction about the ordinary . . . Talese . . . slowly drills down through the mundane subterranean reality of human existence to its fictional core. Robert S. Boynton, author of The New New Journalism Few writers research as thoroughly or ardently as Talese . . . His books are so thorough, and so passionately researched, that they seem to reproach ordinary journalists for a certain tepidness and restraint in their approach. Paris Review A masterful New Journalism pioneer . . . raises the magazine article to the level of an art form. Los Angeles Times In a culture of success and celebrity, Gay Talese has always found his best subjects in failure and decline: Joe DiMaggio in his lonely eclipse; Joshua Logan in the midst of terrible depressions; Floyd Patterson struggling to express what it is to be knocked flat in front of a filled stadium. Talese s lapidary style and impeccable reporting standards have endured far better than the work of some of his more histrionic New Journalism contemporaries. New Yorker Talese is a masterful writer, whose seamless, thought-provoking prose carries the reader as effortlessly as a gondolier in a Venice canal. San Diego Union-Tribune [Gay Talese s] quirky, personal nonfiction, in which the author is very much a presence, helped spawn a whole new approach to feature writing. Booklist Mr. Talese s insight will do more to help us understand the criminal than any amount of moral recrimination. Times Literary Supplement Talese finds the poignant in the everyday Publishers Weekly Talese is a shining example for all writers. Times (Indianapolis) A masterpiece of cultural observation. Paris Review, on Thy Neighbor s Wife Every man who reads it will recognize himself. Every woman will discover, perhaps for the first time, the secret fantasies and public privations, the loneliness and passionate lusts, of most men. Chicago Sun-Times, on Thy Neighbor s Wife First-rate . . . Well-told stories, their social message cumulative: a drastically transformed American sexuality has emerged during [the] past decades New York Times Book Review, on Thy Neighbor s Wife Talese does not proselytize, he informs . . . Readable and thoroughly entertaining. Vogue, on Thy Neighbor s Wife Engrossing and provocative. Library Journal, on Thy Neighbor s Wife

Author Information

"Gay Talese was born in Ocean City, New Jersey, in 1932, to Italian immigrant parents. He attended the University of Alabama, and after graduating was hired as a copyboy at the New York Times. After a brief stint in the army, Talese returned to the New York Times in 1956. Since then he has written for numerous publications, including Esquire, the New Yorker, Newsweek, and Harper's Magazine. It was these articles that led Tom Wolfe to credit Gay Talese with the creation of an inventive form of nonfiction writing called ""The New Journalism."" Talese's bestselling books have dealt with the history and influence of the New York Times (The Kingdom and the Power); the inside story of a Mafia family (Honor Thy Father); his father's immigration to America from Italy in the years preceding World War II (Unto the Sons); and the changing moral values of America in the period between World War II and the AIDS epidemic (Thy Neighbor's Wife). Gay Talese lives with his wife, Nan, in New York City."

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