A Hook in the Sky

Robert, a dashing Frenchman who's just retired, attempts a second life as an artist. His old-fashioned figural paintings appall his much younger, artsy American wife. They fight over art - he's square, she's cool - but what is at stake is their relationship. Until he'd retired, neither had been aware of the differences. The marriage quickly unravels, but that's only the beginning of Robert's problems... After a period of separation marked by sexual adventures and disenchantment, Robert attempts to remodel himself as a contemporary artist to win back his wife. He dreams up a weird installation called a "Hook in the Sky" that could change their lives forever but wreaks havoc around them...A HOOK IN THE SKY is a BB novel - for Baby Boomers as YA novels are for Young Adults. It explores with irony and compassion the issues facing « coming-of-old-age ». They are an echo across the years of those haunting Young Adults , including questions of identity after a lifetime of work and how to start a second life in a different career. A long-standing marriage may unravel, yet love for a younger woman poses challenges of its own. The novel also seeks to answer questions like what is the meaning of Art and what is the real place of contemporary art in our lives. This is Claude Nougat's second novel.