"Elevation" - fragment i okładka amerykańskiego wydania

30 października w USA ukaże się nowela "Elevation" (w Polsce w tym samym czasie książkę wyda Albatros). Dzisiaj amerykańskie wydawnictwo Scribner (Simon & Schuster) zaprezentowało okładkę amerykańskiego wydania, a poertal Entertainment Weekly opublikował jego krótki fragment.

"Scott Carey knocked on the door of the Ellis condo unit, and Bob Ellis (everyone in Highland Acres still called him Doctor Bob, although he was five years retired) let him in. “Well, Scott, here you are. Ten on the dot. Now what can I do for you?"

Scott was a big man, six-feet-four in his stocking feet, with a bit of a belly growing in front. “I'm not sure. Probably nothing, but . . . I have a problem. I hope not a big one, but it might be."

“One you don't want to talk to your regular doctor about?" Ellis was seventy-four, with thinning silver hair and a small limp that didn't slow him down much on the tennis court.

“Oh, I went," Scott said, “and got a checkup. Which was overdue. Bloodwork, urine, prostate, the whole nine yards. Everything checked out. It was diabetes I was worried about. WebMD suggested that was the most likely."

Ellis led him into the living room, where a big bay window overlooked the fourteenth green of the Castle Rock gated community where he and his wife now lived.

“I'm losing weight," Scott said abruptly. “That's what's on my mind. It's sort of funny, you know. I used to steer clear of the bathroom scale, because these last ten years or so, I haven't been crazy about the news I got from it. Now I'm on it first thing every morning."

“I'm sure you know that weight-loss isn't just a marker for diabetes, Scott, it's a marker for cancer. Among other things. How much weight are we talking about?"

“Twenty-eight pounds. So far."