Publisher: Random House
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 09/10/2013
ISBN-13: 9781400069439
ISBN-10: 1400069432

This eloquent examination of paralyzing grief comes from the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Tinkers and follows the terrible journey of a father grieving the loss of his 13-year-old daughter. Kate is the light of Charlie Crosby's life; her death unmoors him thoroughly and spins him into a terrifying descent that he seems unable to stop. With the same skillful prose found in Paul Harding's debut, this second novel "raises the bar" for the award-winning author (O, The Oprah Magazine).

Publisher: Harlequin Books
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 08/27/2013
ISBN-13: 9780778315339
ISBN-10: 0778315339

Long-deceased persons have been showing up, hale and hearty, all over the globe, causing consternation among folks who worry who's going to feed and clothe them. Jacob Hargrave died on his eighth birthday in 1966, but an agent of the bureau tasked with reuniting returned persons with their families has shown up on the Hargrave doorstep decades later, 8-year-old Jacob in tow. Jacob's parents, now in their eighties, must learn to navigate a strange new reality even as the world around them struggles with questions that range from the spiritual to the political. A great "what-if" novel, The Returned is a "beautiful meditation on what it means to be human" (Booklist).

First Chapter  

Publisher: Penguin Group USA
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 08/20/2013
ISBN-13: 9780670026616
ISBN-10: 0670026611

Four years after her husband's death, still-grieving Liv Halston's most cherished possession is a painting her husband bought for her on their honeymoon. Now, she's in danger of losing it to the descendants of painting's original owner. To keep it, she must learn the history behind the painting and discover what happened to Sophie, the painting's 22-year-old subject. Set in both 2006 London and German-occupied France in 1916, the parallel stories of Liv and Sophie make for gripping love stories and thought-provoking reads.

Publisher: Milkweed Editions
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 09/03/2013
ISBN-13: 9781571311023
ISBN-10: 1571311025

Years after losing their son in a horseback riding accident, George and Margaret Blackledge have still not come to terms with his death. Their daughter-in-law has remarried and cut off all contact with the Blackledges, taking their grandson to Montana. Though Margaret wants to rescue the boy, her efforts are challenged by her reluctant husband and the boy's troublemaking stepfamily. Set in 1951 North Dakota, Let Him Go is a character-driven, heart-wrenching tale of a woman whose decision to save her family brings violence into their lives.

Publisher: HarperCollins
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 05/01/2007
ISBN-13: 9780007149827
ISBN-10: 0007149824

Imagine if tiny Sitka, Alaska, had been annexed as a temporary territory for homeless Jews after World War II. This odd proposition makes for a wonderfully surreal setting populated by rabbis, chess masters, and ultra-orthodox gangsters. In the midst of all this is Meyer Landsman, a depressed, alcoholic, and irreligious Jewish homicide cop who's only got a couple months to figure out who murdered a heroin-addicted former chess prodigy and gangster before Sitka reverts to Alaska and Sitka's Jews find themselves homeless once more. "Impressively wacky," says The New York Times.

First Chapter  

Publisher: Little, Brown
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 02/01/2012
ISBN-13: 9780316175678
ISBN-10: 0316175676

Based on a Russian fairy tale, this debut tells of a childless couple in 1920s Alaska, working a farm and fearing the brutal winter. Anxious, tired, and lonely, they build a snow child, only to find that it has disappeared overnight. But soon they spot a little girl living on her own in the woods -- is she homeless? Or is she perhaps a snow fairy? Either way, her appearances hearten the couple. With a spare writing style that enhances vivid descriptions of Alaska's landscape and harsh winters, The Snow Child alluringly adds a bit of magic to hardscrabble farming lives.

First Chapter  

Publisher: Tin House Books
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 01/17/2012
ISBN-13: 9781935639206
ISBN-10: 193563920X

This quiet, meditative novel takes place in a single day, but the memories relayed by Isabel, a single twentysomething thrift-store shopper and collector of things cast off by others, go back to her Alaskan childhood. Though Isabel works at a library, fixing damaged books, she collects postcards from other cities and dreams particularly of Amsterdam. A message she finds on the back of one of these postcards leads her to create a story about its sender and recipient -- and examine the story of her own life. With its clear, clean prose, Glaciers is "lyrical and luminous" (Publishers Weekly).

Publisher: Harper
Check Library Catalog Pub Date: 01/18/2011
ISBN-13: 9780061875724
ISBN-10: 0061875724

Out on Alaska's deserted Caribou Island, a marriage disintegrates faster than ever as Gary insists on building a ramshackle cabin without plans and Irene is weakened by terrible headaches. Their grown daughter, Rhoda, watches from the sidelines as she longs for a proposal from her boyfriend, though their marriage would be no happier. The bleak Alaska landscape makes for an appropriate backdrop to the miseries of their relationships; if you're asking yourself why you'd want to read such an unforgiving novel, it's for the landscape and the sad authenticity of the characters' unhappy lives.