Emma Who Saved My Life

by Wilton Barnhardt

A big, funny, engaging, unsentimental and sometimes even wise book...Delightful."― New York Post

Author of Lookaway, Lookaway

Wilton Barnhardt's novel of coming of age in New York City brims with energy, surprise, irresistible humor, and the heady rush of youth. Its hero, Gil Freeman, a midwestern aspiring actor, comes to the city in search of stardom―but instead encounters the perils of Alphabet City, the desperation of off-off-off-Broadway theater...and the exhilarating, exasperating, absolutely unique Emma, around whom his life comes to turn. Charming and engaging, quintessentially American, Emma Who Saved My Life is one of the extraordinary fiction debuts of our time.

Genres: Fiction, Literary Fiction, Historical Fiction, New York, Novels, Realistic Fiction, Contemporary

496 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1989

About the author

Wilton Barnhardt (born 1960) is a former reporter for Sports Illustrated and is the author of Emma Who Saved My Life (1989), Gospel (1993), Show World (1999), and the New York Times bestseller Lookaway, Lookaway (2013). Barnhardt took his B.A. at Michigan State University, and was a graduate student at Brasenose College, University of Oxford, where he read for an M.Phil. in English.

He currently teaches fiction-writing to undergraduate and graduate students at the North Carolina State University in Raleigh, in the Master of Fine Arts program in Creative Writing.

Source:Wikipedia

Reviews

[Julie · Rating 5 out of 5]

so - here's the story with this one. I'm on a trip from hell with my now ex-husband and his german dad, French step-mom and their two little kids (dad started a second family in his 50's). We lived in Germany at the time and we took a three week trip to america where i was to be the tour guide. Would have been - but no one listened to me so among camping with six to a tent and very long car rides.. ick - it was not fun. But the way to escape? READ! So - when I finished Cider House Rules - we we stopped in the middle of nowhere in Canada (did i mention no one listened to me in my tour of america?) - I found this book. It intrigued me because of the story line but more importantly - Wilton is a fello MSU grad. It was like a beacon of hope. I bought it - read it - loved it. Years later I met Wilton and was able to tell him my story.

I still have my copy - now signed by the author. And I no longer have the husband and his family.

Everything works out for the best, right?

[Patrick · Rating 5 out of 5]

Any time I find this book selling for cheap, I buy it. I now have a mass market paperback, two trade paperbacks, a hardcover first edition and an advance reader's copy. I tell myself it's so I can give a copy to the next person I think will enjoy it, but who am I kidding - they're all for me.

This is an intimate epic. The story has the sweep of ten years and wonderfully examines the moments within them. It made me laugh, wince, cheer. I'm sorry I never met the people within the pages, and glad that I know them so well.

Barnhardt's next book, Gospel, collapsed under its own weight, and his third and (currently) most recent, Show World, was an unpleasant, charmless read (save for the Hanukah dinner scene, far and away the brightest spot of the book). I can't help but wish he'd return to the form he showed here, so full of life, of the joys of regrets and vice versa. Until that day, I'll just keep vacuuming up all the under-five-dollar editions I can find.

[Allan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm a sucker for novels set in NYC, so this book, featured in The Guardian's 'Best Books on NYC Readers' Picks' was always going to be right up my street.


Featuring Midwestern native and aspiring actor Gil Freeman's ten years in the city, starting in 1974, this novel was different from others that I've read set at the same time, thanks to its constant tongue in cheek humour. The NYC portrayed is still grimy and dangerous, but rather than denigrate the place, the author clearly loves the  city, and uses the grungy setting in a positive light, creating ridiculously dilapidated settings for many of the places Gil lives, works and eats. 


The novel starts with him sharing an East Village apartment with Lisa, an aspiring artist and Emma, a wannabe poet, and with each passing year, in which we get extended accounts of specific events rather than overviews of the entire 365 days, we follow their story and are introduced to many colourful characters no doubt exaggerated but at the same time typical of individuals living in the city at the time. We follow all three characters' ups and downs, rooting for Gil as he goes from mishap to mishap, and in particular for him in his relationship with Emma, a quick witted, deeply cynical, self critical character, for whom he cares deeply.


The book weighs in at 470 pages in my edition, and could probably have done with a bit of editing, but it was a very pleasant read for me. I loved both the setting and the characters, and appreciated the humour throughout, which as mentioned I'm not used to in a NYC novel. It reminded me in a way of David Nicholls' or, in the NYC context, Marc Acito's work, praise in my eyes, given how much I like both authors.


A fun read for anyone who either lived through the period in question, or has a love for all things NYC.

[Emily O’Beirne · Rating 5 out of 5]

I couldn't let another chunk of years go by without re-visiting this book. This book that I have read I don't know how many times since I discovered it in my mother's bookshelf, but haven't re-visited for years. It's a book that is such a part of my life that I even put it in one of my own books, as the inspiration for two girls' subway odyssey, and dedicated it to the author

I love this book for being an ode to New York City. For being hilariously funny. For being such a beautiful snapshot of being twenty-something in a time and place I'll never know. But most of all for dealing so well with capturing that relationship you can have with someone who is so big and alive, but so fragile and messed-up at the same time. It portrays the reality of caring so much for someone who can't care back because of their own mental health.

I might never read it again, given that it has, at some points, taken on that feeling when,even after years of not hearing it, that song you listened to over and over and over again makes you a bit sick to listen to again. But still, I'm glad I did.

I heart this book. A lot.

[J.D. Field · Rating 5 out of 5]

Once I lived in new York and was very poor indeed. I used to stop at Barnes and Nobles on 6th Avenue on my way home and read this bit by bit. To me it completely represents my New York experience...

[Lynn Demarest · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book, a coming-of-age story that ends not with triumph but with a reassessment of the initial dream when it's partially realized.

"Emma" is carefully written and deeply imagined. It reads, in fact, like the memoir of an aspiring actor's decade in New York City, where he encounters dirt-poor bohemians, street thugs, ethnic immigrants, and a crazy poet named Emma Gennaro, who bounces in and out of Bellevue.

A few remarks :

1) I was sorry to see crazy Susan tossed aside, like trash into a gutter!
2) I can't believe Gil forgot he had herpes at the end, nor that Emma couldn't keep her mouth shut -- unless she didn't really want to get pregnant after all.
3) I'm unsure about the lack of quotes around the teller's remarks.

Finally, it's not entirely clear (to me, at least) how Emma saved his life -- by not letting him impregnate her?

I actually had an experience not unlike Gil, although certainly with less drama. I started out life as a newspaper reporter and discovered after less than a decade I had no desire to risk my life reporting from a war zone (not that I'd been asked, but I saw it as the pinnacle of the trade) and didn't even have enough talent or drive or whatever it took to even land an assignment on the city desk.

Thanks to Chauncey Mabe for recommending this book.

[Brian · Rating 2 out of 5]

I couldn't finish it; it was tediously self-indulgent and irritating.

If Emma ever ended saving the narrator's life, good for her; I lost interest halfway through.

[Susann]

Written in the late 1980s and set in NYC, 1974-1983. As a love song to NYC, it succeeds. I inhaled the period details, but ugh to the othering of everyone who was not a Midwestern WASP (all but two of the characters). Emma, who is apparently exotic because she is one-quarter Italian-American, falls into the manic pixie dream girl category, but she's also mean and bigoted and troubled.

[Benjamin Thomas · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another stretch read for me. As I’ve mentioned before, I try to utilize the month of December to sample some books that I would not normally choose for myself and this time around I decided to go completely against what I normally enjoy.

As most reviewers note, this is a coming of age novel about a young man, Gil, in his 20’s who is struggling to make it as a stage actor in New York during the 1970’s. It is written in the first person and, as soon becomes apparent, is written as a sort of memoir by the main character as he is looking back on his early days. The book is basically a conglomeration of scenes that depict both the gritty ugliness of the city of New York as well as the near-hopeless struggle of artistic types as they try to make headway in almost impossible circumstances.

This is the first book by Wilton Barnhardt and the style seems like he is trying a bit too hard to be the next big thing. Note: Why do new authors so often try a gimmick of some kind when writing a novel? For example, throughout this book, every time Gil, the POV character says something, there are no quotes around what he says. There are quotes for everybody else but not for Gil. When I read it it’s as if Gill is thinking these thoughts to himself but then another character reacts to it and I realize he has said it aloud. It’s very annoying and often caused me to have to re-read that paragraph to actually understand what was happening. So, for any budding authors out there: use proper punctuation! The rules are there for a reason. Don’t try to get cute and pretend you’re William Faulkner because, frankly his punctuation short-cut style bugs me too.

OK…back to your regularly scheduled review…

This is a difficult book for me to rate. At times I loved the writing, especially how the author used the character’s own actions and words to give them dimension. It’s a great example of “show, don’t tell” technique. The city of New York absolutely breathes with life throughout and most of the time it’s not the glamorous City we see but rather the darker, seedier, kick-your-butt City that leads to the old adage, “If you can make it in New York, you can make it anywhere.” Most of the plot surrounds the artsy NYC scene of the 1970’s with parties, etc. and off-off-off Broadway theater. The novel was published back in 1989 so the many attempts at shocking the reader tend to fall a little flat, especially the numerous references to the gay/lesbian scene. The humor is amazing however, and what I would call “sophisticated” with many a laugh-out-loud moment, mostly of the “I can’t believe she said that!” variety.

So yeah, this is hard for me to rate. I definitely appreciate the book on many levels but at the same time, it just wasn’t really my cup o' tea. While reading it there were times when I was engrossed and times when I wanted to toss it out the window. In the end I am glad I read it but will probably shy away from this author in the future.

[Mollie · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book took me a while to get into. I started it several months ago, put it down, and didn't miss it. But I finally picked it back up and finished it. And really? Not much to write about. It's one of these books that doesn't really go anywhere - it's more of a chronological retelling of this guy Gil's life than a real novel. There's no arc, it's just narrative: this happened, and then this, and then this. And, its worst offense? The NYC obsession. I complain about this every chance I get: the idea that NYC is somehow this magical, different place that is somehow superior to everywhere else. UGH. I think it's such an irritating, closed-minded point of view. Yeah, I like NY, and I think it has some magic, but I think lots of other places do, too. And this book is like a love letter to NYC, which is grating. This idea that if you leave NYC you've somehow failed...I don't know. It's just gross.

That being said: 3 stars still! Because I found the book enjoyable, and funny, and the characters enjoyable and funny. Nothing revelatory, but reasonably easy to read.

[Margaret · Rating 4 out of 5]

A dead-on, hugely funny novel about a young Midwestern man who comes to NY in the mid-70s to be an actor and the infuriating, entrancing young woman who takes him under her unreliable wing. I've rarely laughed out loud so often over a book. It has some echoes of BREAKFAST AT TIFFANY'S in its straight-arrow narrator and the enticing eccentric he adores, and also in its incisive skewering of the (in this case) theatrical subset of NY society. A must read for anyone who has been, is, or will be an actor in New York. Only the fashions and the dollar amounts have changed.

[Susan]

A book author Laura Lippman rereads every year. “...I think it just has one of the best last lines. It’s very melancholy and it’s very wise, and I choke up a little bit every time. I’m choking up now just thinking about it.”

[Ryan Morris · Rating 4 out of 5]

3.5 stars. Review pending!

[Aaron · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hysterical

[Pamela · Rating 3 out of 5]

Covering the years 1974-1983, the protagonist, Gil, a struggling actor, tells of his life in New York and his infatuation with Emma, his sometimes roommate. Reminiscent of "Friends," with a touch of Woody Allen, I loved this book and found it hilarious when it first came out. While I still found parts of it funny this second time around, it took me a long time to get into the novel and parts of it were a slog. The day to day life in New York City during this decade was still interesting, as were the references to the current events during that time and Gil's efforts to succeed on the stage. But, after a short while, I found Emma irritating and tiresome.

[Gordon · Rating 3 out of 5]

New York. The 1970s. Theatre. Youth scene. It would be hard to come of up with a mix of themes better suited to not piquing my interest. So it's fortunate that this book fell into my hands entirely by accident, missing its dust cover. Despite the outrageous posing of certain characters, the narrator has a wonderfully authenticity that couldn't help but win me over. Top that with the odd scene that was laugh-out-loud funny, and I have no regrets, even if, like Gil Freeman, I think it's time to move on.

[Melinda Worfolk · Rating 5 out of 5]

For some reason, I was thinking about this book and realized I had never added it on Goodreads. I read this sometime in the 1990s and I remember adoring it. I read it long before I ever actually went to New York City, but it was the kind of book that made me feel nostalgic for the place. I would love to find a copy to re-read. From what I recall, the novel’s best strengths were its sense of time and place, and its well-drawn characters and their relationships.

[Amy · Rating 2 out of 5]

It feels like this book’s goal is to show how when you’re young, you’re insanely judgmental of just about everybody, but you pick one person to worship, and that person is actually pretty awful and completely tedious to everyone else. So, if that was the goal, he certainly accomplished it. But at what cost? Too many hours that I will never get back.

[Terry Berger · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book many, many years ago. For some reason it’s stuck in my brain. So many little pieces that come back at the oddest times. It has to be 5 stars for the way I think of it 20 years later an smile

[Patrick · Rating 3 out of 5]

Read this 20-30 years ago when it came out and recalled loving the 70s/80s New York it evoked, and that time in my life. It did not quite live up to the memory but there were flashes of greatness here and there.

[Marc · Rating 5 out of 5]

I first read this book when I was 18 growing up in the English suburbs. I fell in love with the book, Emma and New York.

This is a book I enjoy reading every few years , always feels fresh

I moved to New York in my 30s , so while Emma didn't save my life , she may of influenced it a little

[Susan St · Rating 3 out of 5]

New York City, 70s

[Susan Jane · Rating 5 out of 5]

The worst ending of any book I’ve read, but I’d still give 5 stars in a heartbeat. So much fun, so charming. I’ve owned and and lost 3 copies of this book and I really hope another enters my life.

[Jacqueline · Rating 5 out of 5]

A coming of age story. I thoroughly enjoyed this when I was a young adult.

[Carmen Hartt · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5 stars
The main storyline was kind of boring but I enjoyed the background of descriptions of the New York scene in the late 70s.
Do not recommend.

[Mark Valentine · Rating 4 out of 5]

An entertaining, redemption novel.

[Ashley Lambert-Maberly · Rating 4 out of 5]

He's a great writer sometimes (e.g. Gospel, absolutely terrific, and (as of now) sitting at 4.27 on Goodreads, which is high praise). This one is Very Good if not great, well worth your time, interesting, moving, terrific, just not as good as Gospel (and very little is, so that's not a fair comparison. I recall someone saying the TV show Miracle Workers was not as good as The Good Place and thinking "well, of course not.")

I did not enjoy his Lookaway, Lookaway (I could not finish it: I could not even barely begin it, really). I suspect he likes mixing it up a bit, so not every one of his books will appeal. But I have trouble picturing the reader who wouldn't care for Emma even a little bit (they exist, but I can't picture them). It's a bit like a long, different, Breakfast at Tiffany's ... but only in the sense that much of modern fantasy is a bit like a different The Lord of the Rings.

(5* = amazing, terrific book, one of my all-time favourites, 4* = very good book, 3* = good book, but nothing to particularly rave about, 2* = disappointing book, and 1* = awful, just awful. As a statistician I know most books are 3s, but I am biased in my selection and end up mostly with 4s, thank goodness.)

[Silvia Florez · Rating 3 out of 5]

An ok story that kept me entertained but not really inspired by anything

[Marc · Rating 5 out of 5]

People of the world, read this book! The writing is colorful and rich. The characters jump off the page and instantly become your friends (although some you might not want). It's rare that a novel makes me laugh out loud like this one did and it happened numerous times. The story is about a young man struggling to make it as an actor on off off Broadway in late seventies/early eighties New York...and failing miserably. This could have easily been played for saccharine and nostalgic melodrama but instead it's full of funny self-deprecating humor. This book was a complete joy to read.

[Martha · Rating 4 out of 5]

Wilton Barnhardt has a genius for the comic novel. This was very funny and was really enjoyable, though not quite as much as Lookaway, Lookaway. Gil Freeman is an aspiring actor in New York who has two female roommates, Lisa and Emma. He falls for the beautiful, difficult Emma and carries the torch for her for many years. Their final breakup scene is just classic and laugh-out-loud funny.

After ten years as a struggling actor, Gil finally packs it in after realizing that he is never going to be great.