“Tarkington’s writing . . . calls to mind a young Pat Conroy.” —Garden &amp; Gun When Charlie Boykin was young, he’d thought his life with his single mother was really just fine. But when his mother’s connections get Charlie into boarding school and give them access to the upper echelons of Nashville society, Charlie falls under the spell of all that a life among the wealthy can mean. Increasingly attached to another boy, Arch Creigh, Charlie learns how morality has little to do with life in Belle Meade. On into college and after, Charlie aids Arch in his pursuit of a Senate seat, only to be pulled into a growing web of deceit. The novel examines the questions: Why do the poor love the rich? Why do we envy and worship a class of people that so often exhibits the worst excesses and the lowest morals?

The Fortunate Ones

The perfect read for fans of  The White Lotus  or  Succession    “As a novelist, Tarkington is the real deal. I can’t wait to see this story reach a wide audience.”   —Paula McLain, author of  The Paris Wife     When Charlie Boykin was young, he thought his life with his single mother on the working-class side of Nashville was perfectly fine. But when his mother arranges for him to be admitted as a scholarship student to an elite private school, he is suddenly introduced to what the world can feel like to someone cushioned by money. That world, he discovers, is an almost irresistible place where one can bend—and break—rules and still end up untarnished. As he gets drawn into a friendship with a charismatic upperclassman, Archer Creigh, and an affluent family that treats him like an adopted son, Charlie quickly adapts to life in the upper echelons of Nashville society. Under their charming and alcohol-soaked spell, how can he not relax and enjoy it all—the lack of anxiety over money, the easy summers spent poolside at perfectly appointed mansions, the lavish parties, the freedom to make mistakes knowing that everything can be glossed over or fixed?     But over time, Charlie is increasingly pulled into covering for Archer’s constant deceits and his casual bigotry. At what point will the attraction of wealth and prestige wear off enough for Charlie to take a stand—and will he?     For readers of Wiley Cash, Ann Patchett, and Pat Conroy,  The Fortunate Ones  is an immersive, elegantly written story that conveys both the seductiveness of this world and the corruption of the people who see their ascent to the top as their birthright.

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