The Great Man is, quite simply, a novel about a foursome of great women, all of whom had rich lives well into their 70s, and all of whom were hopelessly entangled with the great womanizing painter Oscar Feldman.

Feldman was the arrogant, charismatic Golden Boy of his generation, a man who painted nothing but the female nude and eschewed formal training. Five years after Feldman's death, two competing biographers started researching his life. The novel is set around the lives of the women who survived Feldman, as they bicker amongst themselves and conspire to keep family art secrets.

One could center a lovely book club discussion around the desires and outcomes for the women in Oscar Feldman's life. He married graduate student Abigail, who bore his autistic son and devoted her life to her son's special needs, staunchly refusing to institutionalize the boy. Abigail had family money, which afforded Oscar his painting career, and she was content to ignore his many marital transgressions. She had a rewarding, life-long friendship with her housekeeper, and in her old age, Abigail misses the housekeeper far more than her late husband.

Abigail's arch nemesis was the bohemian, free-spirited mistress of her husband. Teddy bore Oscar's twin daughters and gave them his surname, but never asked to be more than one of his many female conquests. He left nothing to Teddy upon his death, a fact which outraged those in the know but didn't surprise Teddy in the least.

Oscar's butch lesbian sister Maxine is a painter in her own right with a love/hate relationship with her brother. She rabidly encourages Abigail to hate Oscar's former mistress, even when Abigail and Teddy are ready to find common ground. The foursome is rounded out by Lila, Teddy's lifelong best friend, who (surprisingly) never slept with Oscar, and with whom Abigail forms a tentative relationship with during the course of the novel.

Kate Christensen, in addition to painting rich characters worth of contemplation and discussion, portrays women in their 70s as sexy and feisty. Oscar Feldmen is a plot device for a novel that is truly a character study, probing to ask women what bring satisfaction in life -- love? sex? family? The women of The Great Man also examine how the wisdom of age change life priorities, and how one can come to terms with youthful foolishness.