The Upright Piano Player by  David Abbott

David Abbott’s first novel The Upright Piano Player tells the quiet but haunting story of an accomplished and successful man entering into his retirement years. The post-retirement life that Henry Cage expects to be quiet and relaxing, however, quickly becomes complicated both by his need to find healing in his family relationships and by a series of increasingly disturbing instances of harassment from a troubled young man. The novel conveys an intriguing sense of London at the turn of the century, and Abbott’s own longtime role as a leader in the field of advertising, along with his retirement, surely lend some credibility to the way the novel portrays Henry’s unhappy departure from the firm he helped found.

Abbott strikes a nice balance in this novel between the events from the main timeline of the story and those from Henry’s past that seem to most captivate his emotional attention. As he strives to maintain cordial relations with his housekeeper now that he’s spending much more time at home, for example, and as he embarks on a quiet, polite sexual relationship with a much younger woman, he reflects back on the deterioration of his marriage and eventual divorce. Then, confronted with news of his ex-wife Nessa’s terminal cancer, Henry’s feelings become increasingly complicated. Abbott captures the emotional complexities of Henry’s reunion with his dying ex-wife quite well:

In a movie they would have run towards each other as the violins soared, but here in real life Henry had to fight an impulse to turn and hurry away. The voice was unmistakably Nessa’s, but even from fifty yards he could see that this woman was not Nessa. She continued walking towards him, her knees too prominent, her thighs thin and wasted.

The events that lead Henry toward repairing strained family relationships allow for several very tender and beautiful moments in the novel, as well. Henry’s burgeoning relationship with his young new grandson Hal, made all the more precious and delicate by the previous loss of his first grandson under tragic circumstances, provides some of these moments. After Henry has pretended to be someone else—Albert Entwhistle—when speaking to young Hal on the phone, Henry hears Hal telling his parents in the background, “I think it’s Grandpa, just pretending.” Then, when Henry accepts his grandson’s invitation to visit, Hal says, “And Grandpa—don’t bring Albert.”

In addition to the draw of the touching family relationships Abbott creates, The Upright Piano Player is also interesting in its subtle questioning of class distinctions. These class concerns are raised through some of Henry’s other relationships, but without the novel ever becoming overtly “about” those issues. While Henry has enjoyed a great deal of material success in his life and retired from his job a wealthy man, the criminals who have impacted his life and threatened his sense of well-being are individuals from vastly different economic realities. The young man whose attempted auto theft resulted in the death of his first grandson, for one, is the fault of a drug addict lured by the sight of Henry’s expensive camera case in the vehicle. The man who torments Henry, on the other hand, is one who feels no qualms about selling pictures of his girlfriend for easy money:

There was the click of high heels in the corridor. He relaxed. That will be Eileen, maybe she will have some good news. As the drugs claimed him once more he comforted himself: he had seen the way men looked at her body, there was money in that sort of look.

As the story progresses, tension gradually builds regarding the man who has been harassing Henry and what will become of that situation. Abbott’s novel provides a bittersweet and genuine look at the challenge of overcoming past shortcomings and attempting to honor existing relationships through loss and major life change. The characters are distinct and interesting, and the tone and pacing of the story make for a pleasant read.

Reviewed by Chris Corning

The Upright Piano Player by David Abbott
Nan A. Talese, 2011.
Cloth. 272 pp. $23.95.
ISBN-13: 9780385534420