A Slipping Down Life

Anne Tyler's heartbreaking coming-of-age tale that poignantly portrays a bleak and beautiful search for love and self-acceptance.

Evie Decker is a shy, slightly overweight teen who spends her high-school life primarily in isolation, accompanied only by the sound of the radio to fill the silence. But when the voice of nineteen-year-old Drumstrings Casey fills her room one night, she is immediately drawn out of her shell and into an obsessive attraction with this man and his voice. When a botched attempt to engrave his name on her forehead with nail scissors goes horribly awry, she is able to catch Drum's attention. Thus begins a confusing journey of two people who barely know each other trying to understand themselves together.