On the Stairs

A quiet, formally restrained novel charts the parallel lives of two New England families over four decades, beginning with a brief encounter on a school staircase in 1873 and resurfacing in a bustling bank lobby in 1916. Through modest scenes and carefully observed dialogue, the author sketches how Johnny McComas, fresh from a modest background, gradually climbs the social ladder, while Raymond Prince, once comfortably placed near the top, experiences a slow, reluctant descent.

The narrative moves with deliberate pace, offering keen insights into class, ambition, and the subtle shifts that define a generation. By focusing on ordinary moments—greeting strangers on marble steps, the quiet hum of a private academy, the rhythm of a city’s financial hub—the story reveals the larger arc of progress and retreat without resorting to melodrama. Listeners will appreciate the nuanced portrait of early‑20th‑century America, where personal fortunes rise and fall along the same stairwell of history.