Benjamin Nugent

Good Kids Benjamin Nugent

The critically acclaimed author of American Nerd makes his fiction debut with this romantic tragicomedy about a teenage boy and girl who discover his dad is having an affair with her mom. At fifteen, Josh Paquette and Khadijah Silverglate-Dunn catch Joshs father and Khadijahs mother kissing in a natural foods store. They make a pact never to cheat on anyone, ever. They have no problem keeping the vow—until they meet again at twenty-eight, both struggling with career and identity, and both engaged to other people. Part inter-ethnic romance, part intergenerational conflict, Good Kids is a hilarious, sad, handsomely plotted story of love and class in the era of the redefined household. Stylistically adventurous but always accessible, Nugent trains a keen ear on the vernaculars of Generation Y and the baby boomers, as young and middle-aged alike try to decide what parenting, background, and loyalty mean in late twentieth and early twenty-first century America.