SIGERSON, Davitt

PERSONAL: Married; children: two daughters. Education: Studied history at Oxford University.

ADDRESSES: Home—New York, NY. Agent—c/o Author Mail, Random House, Inc., 1745 Broadway, New York, NY 10019.

CAREER: Songwriter, record producer, and music journalist. Former president of Polydor Records; president and chief executive officer of EMI Records, beginning 1994; chair of Island Records U.S., 1998–. Composer of sound recordings David Sigerson, ZE Records, 1980, and Falling in Love Again, Island Records, 1984.

WRITINGS:

Faithful (novel), Nan A. Talese/Doubleday (New York NY), 2004.

WORK IN PROGRESS: A second novel.

SIDELIGHTS: Music company executive Davitt Sigerson's first novel, Faithful, appeared after he had already enjoyed a successful career as a songwriter and record producer. Sigerson, as quoted in Publishers Weekly, said that his novel focuses on "marital sex and parenthood, ecstatically and painfully entwined." Many critics have agreed that Faithful, in the words of a Publishers Weekly reviewer, is a "racy debut." Allison Block, writing in Booklist, called the novel an "unapologetically erotic novel."

In Faithful Nick Clifford, a London trader and man-about-town, marries Trish, a sexy flight attendant. Trish soon falls into an extramarital affair with her first love, the wealthy and generous Joe Somerville. Although Trish finds that she is carrying husband Nick's baby, but she chooses to stay with Joe, all the while carrying on a clandestine liaison with Nick. Discouraged by the situation, Nick eventually moves to New York to work.

Critics were not especially kind to Sigerson's first fictional effort. A Publishers Weekly reviewer, for one, noted that the book "manages to prove that even stormy sex can be ho-hum." A Kirkus Reviews critic similarly called the book "dumb, thin, meretricious, absurd," while Library Journal contributor Kellie Gillespie dubbed the story "both intriguing and disappointing." In the New York Times Book Review, Emily Nussbaum wrote that Faithful's "sophistication is paper-thin" but that it "might be just what the beach bag ordered."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Booklist, March 1, 2004, Allison Block, "Lust in the Afternoon," p. 1138.

Entertainment Weekly, November 29, 2002, Matthew Flamm, "Between the Lines: The Inside Scoop on the Book World," p. 109.

Kirkus Reviews, January 1, 2004, review of Faithful, p. 14.

Library Journal, February 1, 2004, Kellie Gillespie, review of Faithful, p. 125.

New York Times Book Review, May 23, 2004, Emily Nussbaum, "Some Like It Hot," p. 10.

Publishers Weekly, January 26, 2004, review of Faithful, p. 118; February 23, 2004, review of Faithful, p. 50.