Villa Coco — A Novel book cover by Andrew Sean Greer
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Villa Coco

Adult • Fiction • LGBTQ+ Literary Fiction • Literary Fiction
A Novel
Job at an eccentric elderly Baronessa Art thefts complicate the archivist's tasks Affair with a married man unfolds Final plan to reunite lost love Colorful cast of villa inhabitants

An aspiring archivist, determined to begin a “serious” life after an undistinguished undergraduate career, takes an unspecified job with a charismatic elderly Baronessa at her crumbling villa in the Tuscan hills. The Baronessa, known to her friends as Coco, is ninety-two, defiantly youthful, and naturally flamboyant. The young man becomes her all-purpose assistant, charged with cataloging the villa's extensive collection of art and antiques amid a chaotic, colorful milieu of gin-swilling princesses, incomprehensible handymen, roaming boarhunters, nuns, and other local characters.

As he inventories the collection he notices objects vanishing from right under his nose, and despite himself he tumbles into an affair with a married man that complicates his future plans. When Coco loses someone close to her, he becomes an unwitting accomplice in the Baronessa’s great and final plan to locate the love of her life and be reunited before it's too late.

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Edition information

Book details

Publisher
Doubleday
Publication date
June 9, 2026
Print length
270 pages
Language
English
ISBN
9780385551984

Fiction + LGBTQ+ Literary Fiction + Literary Fiction

Reader guide

What to Know Before Reading Villa Coco

An aspiring archivist takes a job cataloging the art and antiques of a ninety-two-year-old Baronessa, Coco, at her crumbling villa in the Tuscan hills. As her all-purpose assistant he must navigate a chaotic household of gin-swilling princesses, incomprehensible handymen, roaming boarhunters, and nuns while inventorying a vast collection from which items begin to disappear. He also enters an affair with a married man that upends his plans. When Coco loses someone dear, he is drawn into her urgent effort to find the love of her life, confronting questions of adulthood, desire, and loyalty.

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G-NRIS™ story intelligence

Why readers connect with Villa Coco

A concise view of the book’s strongest literary signals and the reading interests shared by people connected to it on bks.social.

Story profile

G-NRIS™ identifies Villa Coco primarily as Literary Fiction and Contemporary Fiction. Its strongest themes include Coming of Age, Love and Desire, Memory and Loss, and Identity and Self-Discovery. Prominent narrative patterns include Unlikely Friendship, Fish Out of Water, Forbidden Affair, and Quirky Ensemble Cast.

Reader connection

Readers connected to this book most often reflect Psychological Moral Explorer reader archetypes. Their strongest shared genre interests include Thriller, Science, Literary Fiction, and Historical Fiction. They are commonly drawn to themes such as Exploring The Fractured Self, Survival, technology, and gaming.

About the author

Andrew Sean Greer

Andrew Sean Greer

Andrew Sean Greer is the bestselling author of eight works of fiction, including the novel Less, which won the Pulitzer Prize in 2018. His latest novel, Villa Coco, comes on June 9th. Greer lives in San Francisco and Venice, Italy.
Author information: Wikipedia

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