So Long, See You Tomorrow
Book Summary
Haunted by a memory of human failure, an aging man recalls his friendship, as a boy, with a tenant farmer's son and forces himself and others to recall the causes of a bloody murder and its consequences. Reprint. 15,000 first printing.
Genres:
This book is about:
- Bildungsromane,
- Friendship,
- Illinois,
- Murder,
- Teenage boys,
- Fathers and sons,
- Domestic fiction,
- Fiction
NPR stories about So Long, See You Tomorrow
Three Books...
Devil In The Details: 3 Artful Tales Of Murder
Whether or not murder can ever be "the perfect crime," William Maxwell's So Long, See You Tomorrow is an unassailable perfection of prose, one which forever gives the lie to the notion that editors edit because they can't write. The late, beloved fiction editor for The New Yorker, Maxwell somehow found the time to pen this lean masterwork about fallible memory and fleeting chances. The novel twines stories of rural infidelity, desperate vengeance, and the... more
—Bruce Machart
You Must Read This
In Memory Of A Mentor: 'So Long,' William Maxwell
April 27, 2011 As an aspiring writer, William Lychack was lucky enough to be mentored by his literary hero, longtime New Yorker editor, William Maxwell. Maxwell's novel, So Long, See You Tomorrow, is a meditation on loss and forgiveness; Lychack says every page is touched by care, like rooms of a beautiful house.

Comments
Please keep your community civil. All comments must follow the NPR.org Community rules and terms of use. See also the Community FAQ.
NPR reserves the right to read on the air and/or publish on its website or in any medium now known or unknown the e-mails and letters that we receive. We may edit them for clarity or brevity and identify authors by name and location. For additional information, please consult our Terms of Use.