{"id":30562,"date":"2024-12-02T08:00:14","date_gmt":"2024-12-02T12:00:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/?p=30562"},"modified":"2026-05-02T16:19:36","modified_gmt":"2026-05-02T20:19:36","slug":"david-szalay-plaster","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/2024\/12\/02\/david-szalay-plaster\/","title":{"rendered":"David Szalay: “Plaster”"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

“Plaster”<\/strong><\/span>
by David Szalay<\/span>
from the December 9, 2024 issue of The New Yorker<\/em><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

This week we get a story from David Szalay, an author I have heard so much about but have never read. He’s been on many up-and-coming-writer lists, and his 2016 collection of linked stories, All That Man Is<\/em>, won the Gordon Burn Prize and was on the Booker Prize shortlist.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here is how “Plaster” begins:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n

There’s some sort of holdup. Every day, they expect to fly out, and every day they are told it will be “another twenty-four hours.” They’re staying in a hotel with swimming pool.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\n\n

It’s not really hot enough for swimming. It’s not quite pool weather. It’s, like, seventy-five or something. Still, they spend most of the day poolside — there isn’t anything else to do.<\/span><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

I’m posting this late because it’s been a very busy month so far, but I hope you’re all having a great final month of 2024. And I hope you’ll share any thoughts you have on this story below.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This week’s New Yorker fiction is David Szalay’s “Plaster.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":31063,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"libsyn-item-id":0,"libsyn-show-id":0,"libsyn-post-error":"","libsyn-post-error_post-type":"","libsyn-post-error_post-permissions":"","libsyn-post-error_api":"","playlist-podcast-url":"","libsyn-episode-thumbnail":"","libsyn-episode-widescreen_image":"","libsyn-episode-blog_image":"","libsyn-episode-background_image":"","libsyn-post-episode-category-selection":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_thumbnail":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_theme":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_height":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_width":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_placement":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_download_link":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_use_download_link_text":"","libsyn-post-episode-player_custom_color":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-explicit":"","libsyn-post-episode":"","libsyn-post-episode-update-id3":"","libsyn-post-episode-release-date":"","libsyn-post-episode-simple-download":"","libsyn-release-date":"","libsyn-post-update-release-date":"","libsyn-is_draft":"","libsyn-new-media-media":"","libsyn-post-episode-subtitle":"","libsyn-new-media-image":"","libsyn-post-episode-keywords":"","libsyn-post-itunes":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-number":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-season-number":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-type":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-title":"","libsyn-post-episode-itunes-episode-author":"","libsyn-destination-releases":"","libsyn-post-episode-advanced-destination-form-data":"","libsyn-post-episode-advanced-destination-form-data-enabled":"","libsyn-post-episode-advanced-destination-form-data-input-enabled":false,"libsyn-post-episode-premium_state":"","libsyn-episode-shortcode":"","libsyn-episode-embedurl":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1079,94],"tags":[1461],"coauthors":[505],"class_list":["post-30562","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-david-szalay","category-new-yorker-fiction","tag-2024-new-yorker-fiction"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/Plaster-Featured-Image.jpg?fit=700%2C400&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pqqvZ-7WW","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30562","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30562"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30562\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31064,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30562\/revisions\/31064"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31063"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30562"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30562"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30562"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mookseandgripes.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=30562"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}