Essay Questions

Why did the author choose this title for the book, and what does it mean?

The author drew the title from a quotation by F. Scott Fitzgerald, who wrote "We were the great believers. I have never cared more for any men as much as for those who felt the first springs when I did, and saw death ahead and were reprieved - and who now walk the long stormy summer."

He refers in this quote to the "lost generation" and this resonated with Makkai, who saw many parallels between the lost generation of Fitzgerald's era, and the generation that was lost because of the AIDS epidemic of the 1980s. She also saw many similarities between those who had fled to Paris because they were misfits and artists and felt that they did not have a place anywhere else, and the gay communities of the 1980s who fled to the bigger cities, like Chicago, seeking to fit in themselves. The art scene in Paris was decimated first by the war and then by an influenza virus in 1918. The author sees this as a parallel between the decimation of a generation in the gay community of the 1980s, thereby considering them a parallel lost generation, which is why the Fitzgerald quote seemed so appropriate and fitting to her in titling her novel.

How do the main characters in the book relate to their own family?

Yale is not particularly close to his biological family, he is far closer to his friends and in a sense they are his chosen family even though they are not biologically related. This group offers support without judgement, and also offers a closeness that he feels is lacking in his own family. Yale does not feel embraced by his family because they do not truly understand him, and this is why he gravitates towards his friends.

Fiona also substitutes her friends for her family, but this is in detriment to her relationships with both her husband and her daughter. She feels a great loss when her brother Nico dies from AIDS and because of this become immersed in caring for each of his friends when they become sick; it is a sort of connection to him. As a result, her marriage suffers and her relationship with her daughter becomes rather non-existent.

Claire feels that she lacks a family because her mother is too busy "mothering" her sick friends than mothering her own daughter. This is why she seeks out a family dynamic and ultimately becomes a part of a cult whom she believes offers her what she has lacked all of her life in her own family.