Luster
"Edie is stumbling her way through her twenties--sharing a subpar apartment in Bushwick, clocking in and out of her admin job, making a series of inappropriate sexual choices. She is also haltingly, fitfully giving heat and air to the art that simmers inside her. And then she meets Eric, a digital archivist with a family in New Jersey, including an autopsist wife who has agreed to an open marriage--with rules. As if navigating the constantly shifting landscapes of contemporary sexual manners and racial politics weren't hard enough, Edie finds herself unemployed and invited into Eric's home--though not by Eric. She becomes a hesitant ally to his wife and a de facto role model to his adopted daughter. Edie may be the only Black woman young Akila knows. Luster is a portrait of a young woman trying to make sense of her life--her hunger, her anger--in a tumultuous era. It is also a description of how hard it is to believe in your own talent, and the unexpected influences that bring us into ourselves along the way."--Provided by publisher.
Themes & atmosphere
What you might want to know about Luster
The questions readers send us most often, answered without spoilers.
Edie is twenty-three, a publishing assistant, a painter, and broke. She begins sleeping with an older married man whose wife runs the house's open-relationship rules. When Edie loses her apartment, his wife invites her to stay.
Luster was written by Raven Leilani and published in 2020. It was Leilani's debut novel and won the Kirkus Prize, the National Book Critics Circle Leonard Prize, and the Center for Fiction First Novel Prize.
Luster blends literary fiction with dark social comedy. The voice is acerbic and observational. Many readers find it funny in a deadpan way, though the underlying material on race, age gaps, and survival is serious.
Luster is 240 pages in standard print editions, though page counts vary slightly between hardcover, paperback, and large-print formats.
At an average reading pace of about 250 words per minute, Luster takes most readers 4 to 5 hours to finish.
Luster is a standalone novel by an unknown author, not part of a series.
Luster is available in hardcover, paperback, ebook, and audiobook formats from Amazon, Bookshop.org, ThriftBooks, and most major bookstores.