A review by barefootsong
The Confessions of Max Tivoli by Andrew Sean Greer

5.0

This book drew me in from the first sentence ("We are each the love of someone's life.") and my interest never wavered for the entire story. Max is cursed with a rare disease: his body ages in reverse, so that as a newborn, he appears to be a tiny 70-year-old man, and as he grows older in mind and years his body grows younger in physical appearance. He is writing his "confessions" in his late-fifties, with the physical appearance of a 12-year-old boy. While this may sound like a weird premise for a story, it is beautifully written in the most believable manner. Max is just as real as any other well-written character. It is, as the first sentence implies, a love story, but it is also a wonderful story about life and the nature of monsters (since Max constantly refers to himself as a monster because of his time-in-reverse condition). It's simply an amazing book and I highly recommend it, even if you don't think it sounds like quite your cup of tea (because, honestly, I wasn't sure I would like it based on the description either).