Owen and Vera (Paperback)

With their marriage in crisis, the last thing this couple needed was a coronavirus pandemic, but what if a six month lockdown in a small condo was the perfect prescription to heal their life together? Owen and Vera takes place in the U.S., Russia, France, Maldives and Portugal. Owen is an American middle-class boomer whose childhood as an intelligent oddball segues into a haphazard and reckless adulthood. Vera is a Russian physician who lived through the Soviet era, experiencing hardships and failed relationships. They meet in midlife, fall in love and marry, turning a blind eye to their differences in order to find companionship. Love carries them through the challenges of middle age, but as time passes, their psychological baggage and idiosyncrasies come to the fore, resulting in discord, depression and even violence. When the pandemic strikes, imprisoning them in a small apartment, Owen and Vera use the occasion to come to terms with their flawed psyches and negotiate a pact for navigating their future together.