They were talking but Jude’s eyes were closed, and Willem knew – from the constant, hummingbird-flutter of his eyelids and the way his hand was curled into a fist so tight that Willem could see the ocean-green threads of his veins jumping under the back of his hand – that he was in pain. However, Jude becomes the focus of the novel as his background and the consequences of it are far more complex than those of the other characters. Guess what? He will also go on to be incredibly successful. Jude is an assistant prosecutor in the criminal division of the U.S. He will also go on to be incredibly successful. He wants to create buildings and makes small, detailed models. Malcolm works for Ratstar Architects, a position he only took to please his parents.

Willem is an actor, waiting tables at the beginning of the novel but, like JB, he will go on to become incredibly successful. Early on in the novel he begins to take photographs of their group, photographs that will eventually make him very successful although that success will come at a price. JB is an artist but is working as a receptionist at an art magazine in Soho trying to convince them to feature him. Malcolm’s living at home and JB’s living in a ‘massive, filthy loft in Little Italy’.

Jude and Willem are renting an apartment together. Jude, Willem, JB and Malcolm met at college and have remained friends into their late twenties. I don’t think happiness is for me, Jude had said at last, as if Willem had been offering him a dish he didn’t want to eat.Ī Little Life starts as the story of four friends living in New York City. Are you happy? he once asked Jude (they must have been drunk).

A little life near me