'Crux' is a novel about rock climbing, but risk exists far beyond the mountain’s edge

Summary

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NPR's Book of the Day – “Crux” with Gabriel Tallent (February 17, 2026)

Episode Overview

This episode features an interview with Gabriel Tallent about his new novel, Crux, which centers on the world of rock climbing and explores the notion of risk, friendship, and meaning beyond physical adventure. Tallant, himself an avid climber, delves into why risk is an essential fabric of both the sport and life. The conversation with NPR’s Juana Summers unpacks the novel’s coming-of-age narrative, its characters’ divergent social backgrounds, and the underlying emotional stakes that stretch well beyond the mountain’s edge.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Defining “Crux” and the Nature of Risk (02:01–02:31)

• Juana Summers introduces “crux” as a pivotal term in climbing—a moment of greatest challenge that demands risk for progress.
  • Memorable quote:
    “It’s the most challenging section of a route, the place where...everything inside yourself told you to wait, to stall, to cling to safety. And yet where, if you wanted to live, you had to take the risk.” —Juana Summers (02:05)
• Gabriel Tallent describes his firsthand love for climbing’s “inch by inch terror” and the openness it creates among climbers.
  • Quote:
    "You're on the journey with someone else and it's cooperative...It tends to open people up a little bit. Like I have had some of my wildest and most confessional moments, like sitting on ledges with friends." —Gabriel Tallent (02:31)

2. Character Portraits: Tama and Dan (03:00–04:19)

• The novel’s protagonists, Tama and Dan, are best friends from sharply different socioeconomic backgrounds, united by climbing but facing personal and familial struggles.
  • Dan: Seen as the “disaffected golden child"–good at school, expected to succeed, yet suffering from depression and ambivalence about his future.
    • Quote:
      "Dan is a little bit like a disaffected golden child...he's sort of living through the onset of major mental illness or depression." —Gabriel Tallent (03:09)
  • Tama: A “mouthy burnout” from a working-class family, smart in unconventional ways and desperate for escape from a predetermined, uninspired future.
    • Quote:
      "[Tama] doesn't really see anything for herself other than slowly becoming her mother...a burned out waitress at diners, which is not a future that inspires her." —Gabriel Tallent (03:44)

3. Friendship, Transition, and Social Risk (04:19–05:07)

• Tallent reflects on the undervalued cultural narrative of friendship, especially when life decisions revolve around its importance instead of more traditional models like romantic or family bonds.
  • Quote:
    "Friendship is itself not a relationship that I think is highly valued in the culture...so they don't necessarily have a model for striking out together as friends. And that makes it seem in some ways impossible or risky." —Gabriel Tallent (04:34)
• The pair’s shared dream of climbing is intertwined with this vulnerable, high-stakes friendship.

4. The Broader Meaning of Risk (05:07–06:09)

• Beyond physical danger, the story interrogates whether risk avoidance leads to safety—or to another kind of loss.
  • Quote:
    "They are seeing people around them who, by not taking risks day after day, end up hedged into lives they don't love...just by avoiding risk, you can end up losing everything in just the same way." —Gabriel Tallent (05:29)
  • Memorable moment: Tallent emphasizes that embracing risk is essential for “aliveness and meaning.”

5. Writing the Novel: Process and Self-Discovery (06:09–07:43)

• Tallent shares that, like his debut, Crux took eight years—though many drafts were discarded until he found the novel’s “heart” during the pandemic, influenced by fatherhood.
  • Quote:
    "As I was holding this baby, it was like, that's not what you love about a person, that they succeed or that they climb at the highest levels...I realized it wasn't about climbing at the cutting edge. It was something else. It was the story of friendship and chasing meaning." —Gabriel Tallent (06:51)

6. Character Pressure and Transformation (07:43–09:44)

• Discussion focuses on a pivotal plotline: Tama must care for her sister's children during a family crisis, forcing her to confront uncomfortable, unfamiliar responsibilities.
  • Tallent explains this is designed to test and “ruin” the protagonist, as hardship brings their true core to the surface—a parallel for readers enduring their own dark times.
    • Quote:
      “With writing, something I am trying to do is subject the protagonist to so much pressure that they are destroyed, that they come apart so that we can see their guts...So a lot of times, what you're trying to do is...make a character's worst fears come true.” —Gabriel Tallent (08:28)
    • On hope:
      “If you want to put hope and joy and aliveness in a book, you have to take your characters to dark places because real people are searching for hope and aliveness and joy and from dark places.” —Gabriel Tallent (09:28)

7. Closing Thanks (09:44–09:49)

• Juana Summers concludes the interview, expressing gratitude for Tallent’s insights into friendship, risk, and storytelling.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On risk:
  “Never doing that doesn't keep you safe.” —Gabriel Tallent (05:58)
• On formative friendships:
  "Betting a lot on a friendship, believing in a friendship when the culture doesn't believe in it—how do you make the decisions then?” —Gabriel Tallent (04:44)
• On character and reader resilience:
  "Readers themselves are sometimes going through hard things. So you want to show, like, if you want to put hope and joy and aliveness in a book, you have to take your characters to dark places..." —Gabriel Tallent (09:28)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Introduction to risk and climbing: 00:02–02:01
• Theme of “crux” and challenge: 02:01–02:31
• Characters and relationships: 03:00–04:19
• Friendship and transition: 04:19–05:07
• Exploring risk vs. safety: 05:07–06:09
• Process of writing Crux: 06:09–07:43
• Tama’s family conflict and transformation: 07:43–09:44
• Closing remarks: 09:44–09:49

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Tone and Style

The conversation is candid, reflective, and emotionally rich—much like the themes it explores. Tallent’s language is introspective; Summers’s questions are empathetic and grounded in literary curiosity. The episode offers not just a discussion of a novel, but a meditation on embracing life’s uncertainties in pursuit of meaning and connection.

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Transcript

[Andrew Limbong]

Hey, it's NPR's Book of the Day. I'm Andrew Limbong. What is risk? How do you think about risk? I figure that most of us don't do a quick risk analysis before getting into our cars and driving to the grocery store. When I pop a hard candy into my mouth, I don't start thinking in terms of actuarial tables and the likelihood of choking. But when I see the kids on the street skateboarding without a helmet or someone texting and driving, I do think, huh, that's risky. But maybe it's all risky. These questions come up in today's interview. It's with the author Gabriel Tallant about his novel Crux. It's about two close friends from different tax brackets who bond over a love of climbing. Talent himself is a climber, and he talks to NPR's Juana Summers about the risks worth taking and how trying to avoid risk doesn't always keep you safe. That's after the break.

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[Juana Summers]

Crux is a term that rock climbers know well. It's the most challenging section of a route, the place where, quote, everything inside yourself told you to wait, to stall, to cling to safety. And yet where, if you wanted to live, you had to take the risk. That is how author Gabriel Tallent describes it in his new novel called Crux. It's his first since his debut, My Absolute Darling made its own ascent on bestsellers list back in 2017. Talent is a climber himself and embraces that fear that accompanies the Exhilaration.

[Gabriel Tallent]

I love that climbing can have this inch by inch terror. And it just takes you to spectacular settings that you would never reach in your ordinary life with just wild people. So you're on the journey with someone else and it's cooperative, you're working together, which is something that I have always loved about the sport. It tends to open people up a little bit. Like I have had some of my wildest and most confessional moments, like sitting on ledges with friends.

[Juana Summers]

Talent's new novel begins with one such moment high on a ledge In California between 17 year old best friends Tama and Dan.

[Gabriel Tallent]

Dan is a little bit like a disaffected golden child. He's tall, handsome, good at school, well liked by his teachers, and it's believed that he's going to go on to have a promising future at college. But it's not something that he wants. He's sort of living through the onset of major mental illness or depression. And every night he goes out and climbs with his best friend Tama, who is this sort of mouthy burnout. She's a little bit provocative. She's equally smart, but in ways that don't lend to success at school. So she's not well liked by her teachers and peers, but they're really bonded and they go climbing together and that's the future that he wants. And Tamma herself is a little bit more. Her family is a little bit more working class. There's no chance at college for her if she's not able to make climbing work as a vocation and a future. She doesn't really see anything for herself other than slowly becoming her mother, like a sort of a burned out waitress at diners, which is not a future that inspires her. So she's filled with sort of desperate urgency to escape.

[Juana Summers]

I couldn't help thinking about my own friendships at that stage of life when you're like on the cusp of adulthood and trying to figure out who you are and who you want to be. What was interesting to you to explore about that stage of transition that Dan and Tama find themselves in?

[Gabriel Tallent]

The dream of climbing is for them knit together with their friendship because they climb together. But friendship is itself not a relationship that I think is highly valued in the culture that we have a lot of cultural narratives about. So they don't necessarily necessarily have a model for striking out together as friends. And that makes it seem in some ways impossible or risky. So I'm interested in that and the idea of betting a lot on a friendship, believing in a Friendship when the culture doesn't believe in it, how do you make the decisions then?

[Juana Summers]

Another thing that comes up as I think about Dan and Tamma's shared love of climbing is this element of risk inherent in this passion that they share throughout the book. They attempt these ambitious climbs, they fail, they get hurt just to keep doing this thing that they love. They're literally putting their bodies on the line. Can you talk about that part of the story?

[Gabriel Tallent]

Sometimes we think about risk as if it's something we take on or don't take on, as if Dan and Tamma's life is somehow riskless if they never go climbing. But that's not true. Like, they are seeing people around them who, by not taking risks day after day, end up hedged into lives they don't love. So. So there is this way that just by avoiding risk, you can end up losing everything in just the same way. To, like, chase that sense of aliveness and meaning, sometimes you have to embrace the risk, and that's scary and also important. But never doing that doesn't keep you safe.

[Juana Summers]

I read somewhere else, Gabriel, that it took you somewhere around eight years to get your debut novel, My Absolute Darling, into a form where you felt it was publishable. What about this book? When did you start writing?

[NPR Sponsor Announcer]

Yeah.

[Gabriel Tallent]

How long it did take? It took me eight years with this one as well. I mean, I started this book in. In. In 2015, but that's misleading, because what I did is I wrote novel after novel that didn't work. And then when our first son, Hayden, was born, it was the depths of the pandemic, and I. I had this experience of holding him after he was born and thinking a lot about my life and his life and what I would tell him would matter. And thinking about it, I found that I didn't really believe it was climbing that mattered. And I had written a book about climbing at the highest echelons of the sport, about climbing at important climbs, you know, climbs of substance, famous climbs in some of the most beautiful destinations in the world. And as I was holding this baby, it was like, that's not what you love about a person, that they succeed or that they climb at the highest levels. I felt it lay somewhere else, and so I threw those books away. I really started this book then, and it came together kind of quickly after that, like, after I had the heart of it, and I realized it wasn't about climbing at the cutting edge. It was. It was something else. It was the story of friendship and chasing meaning in your life and pursuing.

[Juana Summers]

That the other thing that I found really interesting, and I'm gonna try to ask this without spoiling your beautiful book for people, is that later in the book, we see Tamma thrust into this family conflict where she ends up having to step in and step up and care for her sister's children as her sister's trying to juggle work and a parenting crisis. And I think it shows this sort of different side to Tamma rather than sort of the brash and brusque and say anything, do anything person that you meet. In the early pages of the book, what did you hope to show about Tamma as a caretaker versus the Tamma that you see when she's with Dan and when she's doing these climbs?

[Gabriel Tallent]

I mean, for one thing, this just happens in people's lives. Like in my life, it seems like you're pursuing a dream, and then a comet comes out of nowhere and changes your entire life. And so I think with writing, something I am trying to do is subject the protagonist to so much pressure that they are destroyed, that they come apart so that we can see their guts. We can see who they are. We can see who they are in their worst moments. So a lot of times, what you're trying to do is you're trying to make a character's worst fears come true. Ask of them the thing that they are worst at. You ask the same thing of Tamma, right? You ask her to be in this role of caregiver that she's terrified of because she doesn't have a good model for it and because it's going to take away from her climbing. So, yeah, I guess you're trying to ruin a character so that we can see how they muster, how they survive, what they do in the darkest nights of their lives. Because that's something that readers are going through. Readers themselves are sometimes going through hard things. So you want to show, like if you want to put hope and joy and aliveness in a book, you have to take your characters to dark places because real people are searching for hope and aliveness and joy and from dark places.

[Juana Summers]

We've been speaking with Gabriel Talent. His new novel is Crux. Thank you so much.

[Gabriel Tallent]

Thank you.

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[Juana Summers]

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[Gabriel Tallent]

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