«The Math Tutor» by Robert Laurence

Sam Butler thinks his life should be about pastern dermatitis, least common denominators and the sophomore pole vaulter from Slovenia. But it isn’t. Sam is a retired widower, who lives a quiet, well-ordered life looking after a small herd of off-the-track Thoroughbreds. Ellen Quincy is a home-schooled ‘tweener, whose family raises chickens on the other side of the highway. Lynda Stratford is a young physics professor from the nearby university. This odd and non-romantic triangle forms in the fall of 2012, and the story follows the three of them for the next six months, a half-year in which Sam’s life is turned inside-out, profoundly and perhaps forever changed. It’s a story about love and friendship, about loyalty and its breach, about what’s lost and what’s found. A story about horses, lasers, and a young girl, wondering about life, death and what follows.