MIDDLE SPOON

A whipsmart, blazingly funny novel about heartbreak, unconventional love, and the way society could be, from National Book Award finalist Alejandro Varela.

The narrator of MIDDLE SPOON is seemingly living the dream, with a doting husband, two precocious children, a fulfilling career, and all the trappings of a quiet, cushy, bourgeois life. But when his boyfriend abruptly dumps him, he spirals into the crushing depths of heartbreak for the first time and must face a world that still can't quite wrap its head around polyamorous relationships. At once the story of a warmhearted but anxiety-ridden middle-aged man's journey through rejection, MIDDLE SPOON is also a daring reimagination of what relationships, marriage, and family life could look like. Varela audaciously probes at the corners of society in desperate need of changefrom taboos around intimacy to the shortcomings of Oscar season, gluten-free food, and pop culturerevealing the internal, interpersonal, and institutional forces that shape us. Equal parts tear-jerking and laugh-out-loud hilarious, MIDDLE SPOON is a book for anyone who has longed, nursed a broken heart, or grappled with love at its messiest. Alejandro Varela (he/him) is a writer based in New York. His debut novel, The Town of Babylon (Astra House, 2022), was a finalist for the National Book Award. His work has appeared in The Point Magazine, Georgia Review, Boston Review, Harper's, and The Offing, among other outlets. Varela is an editor-at-large of Apogee Journal. He has a master's degree in public heal