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The Oyster Diaries
Not yet published
Expected 7 Apr 26From the author of the cult classic Lives of the Saints, a diaristic novel of middle-aged reckoning that roves from Washington, D.C. to New Orleans, from court records to Don Giovanni, all of it riotously narrated by one of American fiction’s most singular voices.
Delery Anhalt—middle-aged, prone to “embroidering everything into vast ideals” like Don Quixote, but incapable of identifying the Shakespearean villains in her life, like Desdemona—is at a crossroads in life. Her father and his peers, the old guard of New Orleans, are entering their twilight years, her daughters are stepping into adulthood, and she is navigating the uncertainty of being midway upon the journey of her life.
Caught between a generation fixed in the past and one intent on changing the future, Delery decides to take stock of herself and the people around her through a series of diaries brimming with wry observations of her upbringing in New Orleans and daily travails in Washington DC, and frank appraisals on what she calls her lions at the the interior demands of insecurity, ego, annoyance, operatic wrath (felt most keenly towards bad houseguests), and remorse.
A disarmingly funny and poignant portrayal of the vicissitudes of adulthood that is as exuberant as it is indignant, The Oyster Diaries sees the return of the beloved character Claude Collier from The Lives of the Saints. Full of uncomfortable hilarities and potent truths, this novel proves to us, once again, that Nancy Lemann is one of our most fearless and original writers on the human condition.
Delery Anhalt—middle-aged, prone to “embroidering everything into vast ideals” like Don Quixote, but incapable of identifying the Shakespearean villains in her life, like Desdemona—is at a crossroads in life. Her father and his peers, the old guard of New Orleans, are entering their twilight years, her daughters are stepping into adulthood, and she is navigating the uncertainty of being midway upon the journey of her life.
Caught between a generation fixed in the past and one intent on changing the future, Delery decides to take stock of herself and the people around her through a series of diaries brimming with wry observations of her upbringing in New Orleans and daily travails in Washington DC, and frank appraisals on what she calls her lions at the the interior demands of insecurity, ego, annoyance, operatic wrath (felt most keenly towards bad houseguests), and remorse.
A disarmingly funny and poignant portrayal of the vicissitudes of adulthood that is as exuberant as it is indignant, The Oyster Diaries sees the return of the beloved character Claude Collier from The Lives of the Saints. Full of uncomfortable hilarities and potent truths, this novel proves to us, once again, that Nancy Lemann is one of our most fearless and original writers on the human condition.
- GenresFictionLiterature
240 pages, Paperback
Expected publication April 7, 2026
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
March 24, 2026
THE OYSTER DIARIES
Nancy Lemann
Thank you for the #gifted copy @nyrbooks , out 4/7.
“By George, some things are difficult. Let’s get on with it. You have to have an iron nerve.
But I am a heartless maniac, blithe and cold. What planet are you from, lady? I keep asking myself. What planet am I living on, to be so coldhearted? I don’t know.”
Following Delery Anhalt between New Orleans and Washington D.C. as she sorts out end-of-life matters for her father and deals with her own trudging, life-altering mess, The Oyster Diaries makes much of the every day and really uncovers that side of us that just doesn’t care about things as much as maybe we thought it would.
I love the way Nancy Lemann is able to parse out the obscure sentiments we have that don’t always get named, the parts of ourselves we’re ambivalent toward, ignorant of, or confused about, but that we still bleed out from slowly but surely anyway.
I love how she builds a contrasting, complex America between New Orleans and DC, displaying disparity and joy, the wide gap of cultures (or the gap between places of culture and those without) and that she isn’t shy about spelling things out plainly.
Lemann has a dry, dry wit. It’s so dry I missed the jokes sometimes until I read back through parts again and realized I nearly missed the out-loud-chuckle this book came to make me anticipate. She’s able to place so much timelessness among modern concerns; it feels like you’re reading a Classic, but about someone you know.
I haven’t felt so deeply known and understood by a book in a long time. I don’t know if that means I’m currently going through the same sort of mental anguish as most middle aged women do, or if it speaks to just how much Lemann touches on the human side of things: the difference between being a good person and being a person who just halfheartedly tries to be one, and how she painstakingly-yet-humorously finds that little pit of eye-rolling, shoulder-shrugging anhedonia that is such a core tenet of being human.
It’s a book about trudging through when you have to, and I think we can all relate. I loved it.
Nancy Lemann
Thank you for the #gifted copy @nyrbooks , out 4/7.
“By George, some things are difficult. Let’s get on with it. You have to have an iron nerve.
But I am a heartless maniac, blithe and cold. What planet are you from, lady? I keep asking myself. What planet am I living on, to be so coldhearted? I don’t know.”
Following Delery Anhalt between New Orleans and Washington D.C. as she sorts out end-of-life matters for her father and deals with her own trudging, life-altering mess, The Oyster Diaries makes much of the every day and really uncovers that side of us that just doesn’t care about things as much as maybe we thought it would.
I love the way Nancy Lemann is able to parse out the obscure sentiments we have that don’t always get named, the parts of ourselves we’re ambivalent toward, ignorant of, or confused about, but that we still bleed out from slowly but surely anyway.
I love how she builds a contrasting, complex America between New Orleans and DC, displaying disparity and joy, the wide gap of cultures (or the gap between places of culture and those without) and that she isn’t shy about spelling things out plainly.
Lemann has a dry, dry wit. It’s so dry I missed the jokes sometimes until I read back through parts again and realized I nearly missed the out-loud-chuckle this book came to make me anticipate. She’s able to place so much timelessness among modern concerns; it feels like you’re reading a Classic, but about someone you know.
I haven’t felt so deeply known and understood by a book in a long time. I don’t know if that means I’m currently going through the same sort of mental anguish as most middle aged women do, or if it speaks to just how much Lemann touches on the human side of things: the difference between being a good person and being a person who just halfheartedly tries to be one, and how she painstakingly-yet-humorously finds that little pit of eye-rolling, shoulder-shrugging anhedonia that is such a core tenet of being human.
It’s a book about trudging through when you have to, and I think we can all relate. I loved it.
Review of advance copy received from Publisher
Where has Nancy Lemann been all my life? This is a brilliant, funny dissection of a life by a woman who has reached the mid point in her journey through life, and is frankly discomposed by where she finds herself. I need to track down a copy of "Lives of the Saints" when NYRB releases both these books in April.
March 26, 2026
3.5 stars, rounded up. Loved the middle of this novel. Beginning and end- not so much.
Review of advance copy received from Publisher
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Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews