Trailer Park Tuesday: White Fur by Jardine Libaire

The trailer for Jardine Libaire’s new novel White Fur oozes 1980s New York City grit and glitz to such a degree, I picture Bret Easton Ellis standing off-camera with a mirrored tray in his hands, ready with two snowy lines of cocaine. Though the novel is less Less Than Zero than it is Romeo and Juliet, White Fur looks like it’s fueled with an endless supply of pharmaceuticals and sex that will drive readers forward through the pages. As the publisher’s plot summary tells it, the novel focuses on two star-crossed lovers: “Elise who grew up in a housing project without a father and didn’t graduate from high school; and Jamey, a junior at Yale, heir to a private investment bank fortune and beholden to high family expectations ....White Fur follows these indelible characters on their wild race through Newport mansions and downtown NYC nightspots, SoHo bars and WASP-establishment yacht clubs, through bedrooms and hospital rooms, as they explore, love, play, and suffer.” With an energetic pace and flickering jump cuts, the trailer certainly gives us a good feel for the 1980s urban life, both high- and low-. As Kirkus Reviews notes, we get that in the book as well: “The real strength of the novel is its Technicolor atmosphere: Libaire’s New York is a glittering whirlwind, raw and sweaty and intoxicating. A page-turning whirlwind steeped in pain and hope.”

Trailer Park Tuesday is a showcase of new book trailers and, in a few cases, previews of book-related movies.