Award-winning author Joyce Carol Oates reads 'Late Love,' a story exploring marital dynamics, nightmares, suspicions, and cultural themes. The tale follows a newly married couple grappling with pasts, age, and loneliness, offering a thought-provoking look at relationships and uncertainties.
The husband's vulnerability in nightmares exposes deeper fears and insecurities in their marriage.
The wife's unsettling discoveries and suspicions unravel a darker truth beneath their relationship.
Deep dives
Newlyweds navigate the challenges of nighttime disturbances
An aging couple, both in their second marriage, navigate the challenges of night disturbances in their new shared home. The husband, known for his scholarly achievements and public persona, reveals vulnerability during troubling nightmares. As the wife witnesses his nighttime distress, she grapples with understanding his deeper fears and insecurities, leading to a complex dynamic in their marriage.
A wife's disorientation and fear as she uncovers unsettling clues
Through a series of unsettling events, the wife uncovers mysterious details about the husband's past, including suspicions about his deceased former wife's fate. As she delves deeper into these discoveries, encountering leeches in a harrowing nightmare and facing the husband's secretive behavior, the wife grapples with fear and suspicion, questioning the true nature of her marriage.
Clues of potential danger and manipulation in the marriage
Hints of potential danger and manipulation surface as the wife confronts disturbing occurrences. The husband's alarming actions during nighttime episodes, coupled with the wife's unsettling discoveries, suggest a darker truth beneath the facade of their relationship. As the wife navigates uncertainty and fear, she must decipher the husband's intentions and confront the possibility of a menacing reality within their union.
Uncertainty and tension escalate in a marriage plagued by dark revelations
Amid escalating uncertainty and tension, the wife grapples with confronting the chilling truths unraveling within her marriage. Dark revelations, mysterious clues, and eerie encounters cast a shadow over their relationship, inciting fear and doubt in the wife's mind. As the narrative unfolds, the marriage becomes engulfed in a web of secrecy, danger, and potential treachery, leaving the wife to navigate a precarious path fraught with unsettling discoveries.
Joyce Carol Oates reads her story “Late Love,” from the April 22 & 29, 2024, issue of the magazine. Oates, a winner of the National Humanities Medal and the Jerusalem Prize, among others, is the author of more than seventy books of fiction. A new novel, “Butcher,” and a story collection, “Flint Kill Creek,” will be published later this year.