STRETHER'S BOY

Man Booker Prize Winner John Banville praised Berkman's last two novels in TheAmbassadors Trilogy. For this prequel: In Strether s Boy, a prequel to Henry James s The Ambassadors, Berkman has writtenanother wonderful volume in his Ambassadorial trilogy, inventive, intricate andwholly persuasive. The Master would surely bestow his blessing on the venture. For the sequel, Banville says: I m greatly enjoying and admiring [this sequel] I very like the fluent, fluid styleand the intricacies of plotting of The Product of Woollett a sly witty title, by theway. I m particularly charmed by the way [it] manoeuvres [sic] James s tale and hischaracters into an aesthetically pleasing sequel to The Ambassadors congratulations. Gregory Maguire, author of Wicked, says of the second novel in Berkman s TheAmbassadors Trilogy, called In the Presence of Chad Himself: an amazing job perfectly in charge of the narrative it is succeeding wildly and I m delighted to [say] how much I enjoyed it. Strether s Boy is the first part of a trilogy inspired by Henry James s The Ambassadors. After this prequel comes In the Presence of Chad Himself as the paraquel (sametime, plot and characters as the original James novel, but with a different narrativepoint of view, like Wicked is to The Wizard of Oz); and finally comes The Productof Woollett as the sequel to The Ambassadors.