Blake Bailey

John Cheever (1912-1982) spent much of his career impersonating a perfect suburban gentleman, the better to become one of the foremost chroniclers of postwar America. Written with unprecedented access to essential sources--including Cheever's massive journal, only a fraction of which has been published--Blake Bailey's biography reveals the troubled but strangely lovable man behind the disguises, an artist who delighted in the everyday radiance of...