I like reading about geezers far more than twentysomethings, middle-aged whiners (too close to mi casa), or, for the love of Christ, children, so J.M. Coetzee's Slow Man about a 60-year old who gets run over on his bicycle, loses a leg and then requires care, intrigued. How long will it be before we're all taking care of parents? What indignities await? What uncomfortable revelations? Will anybody tell the truth in the final years? Old age too often steals dignity and prohibits fun. Some of the desires go, but not all of 'em, and what a cruel bitch of an evolutionary design to keep one from the good stuff at the end.

The slow man of the title falls for his nurse, of course, but she has other needs, like getting her son into an expensive private school and keeping her daughter from ending up preggers. The dance is to see who can get the most of what he/she wants/needs, and who would you bet on, a feisty 40-year old Croat mother of three or a lovestruck lonely man lusting after a nurse's calves? Elizabeth Costello, the title character of a previous Coetzee novel, makes her appearance here as a crusty and wizened old broad who appears out of nowhere as the crane of fate and a straight-talking soundboard and matchmaker to our quietly suffering hero. The trio set, the plot plays out, but it's Coetzee's ruminations on care, aging and the regret of paths not taken that make this worth the time.

Is Coetzee really the master the Nobel committee deemed him? After reading four of his novels, I ain't entirely convinced, but I like all of them, and Disgrace delivered big on both readings. This one won't woo the masses, but it's five hours I was happy to spend.