Radiant Days is thick with detail, angst, desperation, ennui, and culture shock. The story is set in post-soviet Budapest where expats live cheaply and spout philosophy and political theory without doing much else. Our hero, Anthony, accompanies a Gisela to Hungary and finds he might be there under false pretenses. As the lies and truth are revealed they don't seem to mean much to him - he is interested only in his modest goals of appearing cool and screwing Gisela. The story moves to the Balkans (during the height of the war) and life gets riskier and more complicated.

Michael FitzGerald tells a story within a story - how an average college educated American knows so little about the rest of the world and the history of long time animosities, that everything has to be explained to him as he travels. Fitzgerald is brutally truthful with all his characters - at times I hated some and liked others, only to have my position switched in the next fifty pages.

I loved this book, and I can't stop thinking about it!

i have read so many books in my life, boring ones, funny ones, romantic ones, and sad ones. but as i came upon this book i realized it was so boring, i turn a page and its talking about the same thing over and over again. it makes me yarn and sleepy every time i skim through the page and yes in the middle in the book too where it was suppose to get exciting but NO.

I enjoyed this book SO much. And not just because I hail from Michael's home town. I read it in 4 days and it usually takes me over a month to get through a book. It was a history lesson in a non-boring way. A first person look at how low a man will go. And nothing was held back. Made me want to quit my tech job and find an attractive foreign man of my own to follow overseas. Except i'd be the one doing the abandoning. Go out and get this book already!

Foremost, this is a good read. It's one of those you-can't-look-away stories, which ends up implicating everyone, all the characters, the whole human race. Funny, and grim, and smart, and nasty. Highly recommended.

I loved this book!! It's a fresh, funny and insightful look into the male ego and an honest reflection of an American attitude on international politics. This is the best novel I've read in many years. It's smart, clever and well written. I loved it! This is the first time I've ever written a review on Amazon and I was compelled to do so because of how much I enjoyed reading the book. Thanks Michael Fitzgerald for gracing us with your first novel.