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About
Arthur Parkinson is fourteen during the dreary winter of 1974, experiencing the confusing pangs of adolescence and the pain of his parents' divorce. His world is shattered further by the sudden and violent death of Annie Marchand, his beloved former babysitter. Narrated by the adult Arthur, who continues to be haunted by memories, the story of a young man's unraveling family and the circumstances leading up to Annie's death form the backdrop for an intimate tale of the price of love and belonging, told in a spare, translucent, and unexpectedly tender voice.
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Reviews
"O'Nan is a skilled writer who views the lives of his working-class characters with unsentimental compassion…The novel's elegiac tone is perfectly controlled, and angst and the lingo of male adolescence are rendered with wry fidelity."
Publishers Weekly
"ONan weaves together…seemingly disparate small-town tragedies…with consummate skill, seamlessly shifting the focus among characters…This winner of the 1993 Pirates Alley William Faulkner Prize for the Novel is recommended for fiction collections."
Library Journal
"Beautiful and harrowing...An exquisite double helix, each of its two strands the tale of an unraveling family, curving in tenuous but essential relation to the other."
Elle