Chances Are . . .: A novel

When sixty-six-year-olds Lincoln, Mickey, and Teddy reunite for a long weekend, they must confront the pain they all still carry surrounding the disappearance of Jacy, the girl they all loved in college, over forty years ago. Richard Russo’s Chances Are . . . spins this mystery into a compelling tale of friendship, sacrifice, loss, and redemption.

At Minerva, the small liberal arts college the boys attended on scholarship, the trio worked as hashers in the kitchen of the Theta house until Lincoln’s good looks won him a spot as a server. The boys knew their place in the hierarchy of the school, but they dated Theta girls and fell head over heels for one: Jacy. She came from money but never lorded it over them, and the night they all crowded around a small television to wait for the boys’ draft numbers to be called, she was as heartbroken as they to discover the war was no longer simply an idea. As one boy’s number was called early, the danger of adulthood pushed them towards a future for which none of them were prepared.

The book is darkly humorous at times, particularly in its portrayal of the political and social attitudes of the late 60s and 70s, which contrast those in 2015 during the run up to the most recent presidential election. But it is the utter joy and heartbreak these three men share that make Chances Are . . . a near perfect book.