Redhead by the Side of the Road: A novel Kindle Edition

Lighthearted, warm, subtle and witty, “Redhead By The Side Of The Road” is one of those books towards which one instinctively reaches out in times of despair. It is an antidote to anxiety, an atavistic yet soothing remedy to frayed nerves and an effervescent read that suffuses optimism in the reader. The smile induced by Ms. Tyler’s book will linger long after the covers come down on the 179 pages embedded within their confines.Micah Mortimer, is forty-four and is a creature of unvarying habit. He is also an animal of processes and procedures. Setting off on a run every morning at seven fifteen, he is also a stickler for cleanliness and rules. He has cleaning and mopping days, ‘kitchen days’ and many other chore days. He also moonlights as the super of the very ordinary looking apartment that he inhabits. For a living he makes house visits helping bewildered people extricate themselves from challenges posed by Information Technology. Operating a one-man company called “Tech Hermit”, Micah is the messiah of modems and wizard of the web as he goes about resolving various issues ranging from the silly to the subtle. For example, he is called in by an Asian man who wants Micah to clean up a cache of porn stored by his son in the depths of hidden folders. Micah is impressed and amused as he pries open the offending documents that are saved under prosaic sounding titles such as “Sorghum Production in the Eastern States, Population Figures, Dayton Ohio…”Although in a muted and steady relationship with a fourth-grade teacher, Cass Slade, Micah’s tryst with both romance and women, are putting it mildly, sketchy. Women seem to slip away from him a la water off a duck’s back. He just cannot seem to hold a relationship steady. This clockwork pattern of Micah’s life undergoes an abrupt change when he finds a adolescent sulking boy at his doorstep, announced, one evening. Claiming to be the son of one of his ex-girlfriends, Adam Brink has a profound issue in life that requires immediate resolution. Before he can even say cheese, Micah finds himself in the eye of an intricate storm. And when Cass incredulously declares their relationship to be done and dusted, Micah finds himself in an existential crisis.As things begin to unravel in unimaginable ways, both comical and embarrassing, how Micah goes about tackling them forms the crux and core of Ms. Tyler’s eminently readable book. The former Pulitzer Prize winner is at her vintage best as she produces a perelegans! Hence it does not come as one bit of a surprise that “Redhead By The Side Of The Road” has been nominated for the Booker 2020 long-list. In all probability with its story line sans a single blemish and a catharsis inducing narrative, the book may invariably find a place in the ensuing short list as well.Even if by some unfortunate contrivance of circumstances and fate, if it is deprived of such a nomination, it will still continue to be read with joy and zest!

I liked this story, which has quizzical characters and a sort of threadbare desperation. The main character is trapped in his life like a caged animal and only realizes this as he approaches middle age. I was sorry when it ended.

So many reviews say the same thing: What happened to the rest of the book? It was a long short story. I wish it had been marketed that way. Anne Tyler is one of my favorite authors and I really looked forward to this book. I bought it without reading the reviews so I was completely unprepared with how abruptly it ended. Anne is such a good writer and creates such compelling characters, to suck the reader into the story and then just...bam...end it. It was almost like she got tired of writing this book.Still, disappointing as the abrupt ending was I guess I'd still buy it because the small amount that was there was, like all Anne Tyler books, engaging.

Baltimore resident Micah Mortimer is one of Tyler's most memorable characters yet, in a lifetime of creating memorable characters in that city. The 43-year-old single man lives a life of unvarying routine, never wavering in how he spends his day -- the morning routine is set in stone, starting with a quick run, his hot coffee, and ditto hot shower and breakfast. He is rent-free owing to the arrangement with his landlord -- who has retired/relocated to Florida -- in return for janitorial services, Micah saves on rent. And he is super-reliable and conscientious, making repairs and assisting residents of the building in a myriad of ways. What little money he does make is from his IT company, Tech Hermit. The name of his company is telling: he is almost -- but not quite -- a hermit. Clearly, with his lack of desire for social contact except when necessary, hinting at a spot on the autism scale, and with a cool relationship with a 4th grade schoolteacher that he seems to like for what it is , i.e., not really going anywhere, he is content with his life. Until he is not. Several things happen at once -- and, yes, that redhead at the side of the road is part of it -- and he finally begins to question what is going on with his life, why his teacher girlfriend wants more, how to deal with a somewhat shocking personal event, and what he needs to do about all of these things. Micah is utterly lovable. He helps people; it's second nature to him. No, he's not warm and fuzzy, but he is a good person ... just ... different. Some have complained that this novel is too short. No, it is not. It says what it has to say and is a satisfying and lovely read. I enjoyed it immensely!Jo Manning, published author10/3/20

Anne Tyler has been my favourite novelist for years now, ever since I saw The Accidental Tourist in 1988 and decided to read the book. It's one of the few times a movie actually led me to a book, although it did happen again with Remains of the Day in 1993 and Trainspotting in 1996. (I might never have discovered Irvine Welsh if it wasn't for Danny Boyle's brilliant depiction of a group of heroin addicts in a depressed area of Edinburgh. Who could ever forget Robert Carlyle's performance as the terrifying, alcoholic psychopath Franco Begbie or Ewan McGregor's hallucinations of a baby crawling on the ceiling? Spoiler alert: if you haven't seen the movie, the baby is already dead.)But back to Anne Tyler. Since that first book, I've made it a policy to buy every one of her books as they come out. I buy them in hard copy, I read them immediately, and I never give them away. I am, in other words, a fan. Why is that, do you think? Well, lately I've been asking myself why I rush to grab her books hot off the press and wait with anticipation for the next one. She's not necessarily the greatest fiction writer in the English language and as far as I can tell none of her books have been included in any of the lists of 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die. She has, however, won a score of prizes and was nominated for the Pulitzer three times (she won it in 1989 for Breathing Lessons). She's been compared to John Updike and Jane Austen, and many of her books - she's written twenty-three - have been New York Times Bestsellers.The reason people love Tyler, as far as I can make it out, is that her stories are very satisfying. There's a pattern to them and if, like me, you like that pattern, you are going to enjoy the story from beginning to end. Part of the pattern has to do with the characters: they are unusual. And by unusual I mean the men are not heroic, the women are usually nice-looking but not gorgeous, the narrative is almost never dramatic. Nobody gets killed, although the characters often carry the baggage of people they have loved and lost and it makes them, in one way or another, just a little different. Which is what I love about them. Her characters feel real - they feel like someone you might know, or used to know. Someone who lives down the street, or married your sister, or taught you back in high school. Tyler writes about ordinary characters and makes them fascinating. And that, my friend, is something close to genius.Take her 2020 novel, Redhead by the Side of the Road. Like almost all her books, it's set in Baltimore where Tyler has lived since the late 1960s. Micah Mortimer is a 43-year-old building superintendent who has his own tech support business. He lives alone and he has a girlfriend, Cass, who does not live with him. (He refers to Cass as his "woman friend" because he refuses to call anyone in her late thirties a "girlfriend".) Micah has a set routine - "etched in stone", Tyler tells us. At seven fifteen every morning he goes for a run; around ten or ten-thirty he sets out on his tech calls; afternoons are spent working around the building; in the evening he may hang out with Cass - otherwise, by ten o'clock he's in bed. His days have been proscribed in this way for several years and he's perfectly happy to keep them that way.Early in the story, however, two things happen to blow things to smithereens. Cass tells him she's being evicted from her apartment and a young man turns up at his door claiming to be his son. Micah's meticulously organized life is thrown off-kilter; Cass wants him to invite her to come live with him and Brink, the would-be son, is hoping for the same. Micah's disinclination to accommodate these expectations cause friction between him and Cass, who breaks up with him, and his sister and her family, who like Cass and believed she was perfect for Micah. As for Brink, he leaves after Micah gives him an ultimatum: call your mother and let her know where you are or get out. Brink chooses to get out, leaving Micah with the sense that he could have handled the situation more tactfully.Anne Tyler writes about the way we each, as individuals, navigate the path we've chosen. Or, quite often, the path that has been chosen for us. She writes about marriages that are growing old and changing (Breathing Lessons), the tensions and secrets within middle-class familes (A Spool of Blue Thread), and the curious consequences of unexpected, even unwanted, encounters with other people (The Accidental Tourist). And underpinning all of this is the theme of mortality - we are human, we are born, we die. What we do in between those two points may not matter to the rest of the world but it's important to us.The characters in Redhead by the Side of the Road are imperfect beings. They make mistakes, say the wrong things, struggle to connect with those around them. But almost invariably they have certain qualities that make us root for them: they have the capacity to learn, to change, to become better people.  Her characters eventually open themselves up to life, to the promise of another way of living. This is what I love about her books and this is why I keep reading.Tyler, Anne. Redhead by the Side of the Road. (2020) Bond Street Books.

I've read several Anne Tyler books over the years and try to look out for any new novels. This book had appeared on many recommendation lists so I was keen to read it.The book was first published in 2020. It has 178 pages split into 8 chapters and uses a fairly large font.It's a wonderful book in the way that it quickly draws in the reader. I adore Micah and think that most people would be able to empathise with some parts of his world.The narrative is simply beautiful and beautifully simple - it has a straightforward approach which seems to complement Micah's character so is particularly effective when describing him.Micah has an extended family who are at odds with his ordered way of thinking. Whilst he does not understand them (nor they him) there is a lovely tolerance and deep love on both sides that come only come from a familial relationship.There are obstacles that come into Micah's life during the story and they are all dealt with in a calming way that makes this book quite a meditative experience to read.We are led to believe that Micah isn't happy but then seem to be told that he is content. The result is a wonderful mixture of emotions which is completely familiar to everyone - little around us is exciting or devastating with most of our worlds being vaguely contented with not much changing - and there is some happiness to be found in that.

It's a novel by Anne Tyler, what's not to like? I'm not sure Amazon had much to do with it!

What can one say about Anne Tyler? It is difficult to add to anything that has not already been said. She cerainly cannot be categorised. Never disappoints.

Déçue par ce roman d une auteure que j apprecie d habitude. En lisant ce livre, je n.ai cessé d attendre que l histoire commence...c est sans doute le but de l auteure qui insiste sur la monotonie, les rituels maniaques et la difficulté à communiquer du héros...le livre en devient ennuyeux. Or une vie de " riens" peut-être passionnante ..ce n est pas le cas ici,les personnages sont peu attachants et les situations peu crédibles...l épisode du" faux fils" est particulièrement irritant...