100 Days

This sweet, emotionally authentic debut takes two best friends—aspiring filmmaker Jake Valentine and musician Aiden Calloway—on a post-collegiate RV trip across the country. They park at Happy-Marts, watch movies chosen for each state, talk though childhood angst while exploring tourist attractions, play “What would we film here?” and occasionally meet up with Aiden’s band. Even though they know that “sex complicates everything,” they fall into a physical relationship, and soon it’s clear that the road-trip fling is the manifestation of a love connection that’s been building since childhood. Hale does a great job expressing Aiden and Jake’s fondness, rituals, deep familiarity, and companionable intimacy in a way that depictions of relationships between men often lack, but the focus on suburban 20-something relationship angst turns the vastness and diversity of America into a bland, uniform backdrop, and the conceit of touching on all 50 states without providing enough real adventure in them makes the book feel much too long for the love story at its heart. (Apr.)