Daniel Cabot Puts Down Roots

Daniel Cabot Puts Down Roots (2022) Cat Sebastian (The Cabots #3)

Set in 1973 in New York City

Daniel returned from the war a bit lost. His mother used her influence to make sure he spent his time sitting at a desk, as safe as it was possible to be. So he’s living in a slum and working in the abandoned lot beside his apartment.

He drank too much, punched a couple of dickheads, and—almost as an afterthought—wrote some music reviews which the Village Voice inexplicably paid him money for.

Alex and his best friend Mary run a clinic. Really, Mary was his only friend until he met Daniel.

“If I needed something, you’d make sure I had it. So why wouldn’t I do the same to you?”

Alex couldn’t think of anything Mary had ever needed from him, but he was afraid to point this out in case it caused her to realize that he was a useless friend.

Cat Sebastian states in the introduction that Alex is autistic, although that wasn’t an identifier at the time.

He didn’t like the idea of people thinking about him in the first place, and liked it even less when what they were wrong in their assumptions.

Alex’s biggest problem is that he knows he’s difficult, but can’t change himself.

Alex knew by now that Daniel wasn’t going to stop being his friend, but sometimes he thought that Daniel shouldn’t want to be.

Obviously, I identified with Alex.

It was true that Alex wanted to be alone, but he often wanted to be alone. Usually it was because he was just done coming up with words or arranging his face appropriately, but maybe that didn’t need to be a problem with Daniel, who had seen him in that state often enough. Sometimes it was because things were too loud and he needed the quiet, controlled environment of his own apartment. But sometimes it was because he was afraid he was about to have an emotional response that was so disproportionate to the situation that it would alienate everyone around him.

UGH.

Like her other books set in the 1950s and 60s this is a quiet story about two people learning to acknowledge what they are to each other, and coming to terms with how they can be that.

Characters: Alex Aleksander Savchenko, Daniel Cabot, Mary, Paul Chan, Lauren and Jacob, Miriam Epstein, Blanca Martinez, Patricia Cabot, Thomas Cabot, Everett, Magda, Mrs. Cabot, Mrs. Savchenko, Mr. Savchenko, Polyna, Stepan, Larysa, Dr. Delgado

Cover by Bran at Crowglass Designs

Published by Cat Sebastian

Rating: 8.5/10

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