The Duration

Inspired by an old Berkshire County unsolved mystery, Fromm’s fiction debut blends a zany adventure with a low-key exploration of nostalgia. Pete Johansson, a newly single Boston lawyer in his late 20s, returns to the western Massachusetts town of Gable, where he grew up, at the request of his childhood druggie pal, Philip “Chickie” Benecik. Chickie continues to be obsessed with acquiring the rhino horn that he’s sure is on the property of Fleur-de-Lys, an estate on which he and Pete did an extensive report at the request of a teacher and the police chief as penance for being caught trespassing there years before. Their friend “Jimmer” O’Neill, now a venture capitalist, gets Pete into Head-Connect, the high-end spa that has taken over the property, and Pete must decide whether to tamp or fuel Chickie’s wildness. Fromm (Expatriate Games: My Season of Misadventure in Czech Semi-pro Basketball) depicts a sad tenderness between men with common histories, afraid to grow, and trapped into thinking their best moments are in the past. (May)