Noah's Compass

A lonely, single, 60-year-old man, recently laid off from an disappointing job as a history teacher at a private school, is randomly attacked in his new apartment and left with no memory of the assault. The memory loss is so upsetting that he starts investigating ways to somehow recover the episode, in a variety of unobtrusive ways, but ends up stumbling into a relationship that forces him to re-evaluate his entire life. He's always just bumbled along, avoiding confrontation and living only half-aware of the world and people around him. But this relationship makes him pull his head out the sand and attach some meaning to the memories he's avoided for so long.

A wandering, superficially aimless story, but it still expresses some understated life lessons that seem quite relevant to people who are going through transitions, or who feel like they are just going through the motions of living.

The day will come one day when there will be no more new Anne Tyler and the world will be a sadder place for it. But for now, we have Noah's Compass, Tyler's latest. Noah's Compass tells the story of Liam Pennywell, a man who has been asked to retire from teaching, divorced, widowed, somewhat estranged from his children, a man who goes through the motions and can't figure out any other way to live.