Spending

By Mary Gordon,

Book cover of Spending: A Utopian Divertimento

Book description

Monica Szabo, a middle-aged, moderately successful painter, encounters B, a wealthy commodities broker who collects her work. B volunteers to be her muse, offering her everything that male artists have always had to produce great art: time, space, money, and sex.
Passionate, provocative, and highly engaging, Spending displays Gordon's maverick…

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Why read it?

1 author picked Spending as one of their favorite books. Why do they recommend it?

Spending is about a divorced artist and mom. It starts with a middle-aged protagonist reluctantly giving a gallery talk. She complains that male artists often have muses to do their laundry and supply sex, thereby providing practical and “therapeutic” support. A man in the audience stands up and offers to be the artist’s muse. The story is about what happens when this stubbornly independent woman takes him up on it. I totally related to the crusty heroine who has fought for everything she has and distrusts fortune when it offers abundant gifts. 

From Leslie's list on for smart woman over forty.

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