Synopsis This debut novel from the talented Stewart O'Nan is narrated by the now adult Arty Parkinson, who reflects on the painfully befuddled winter of 1974 when all hell broke loose, including the violent death of his beloved babysitter Annie Marchand. O'Nan renders with perfect pitch the dialectic between the adult Arthur who reflects on his childhood with emotional distance and the 14-year-old Arty who experiences the pain of a divorce and the confusion of adolescence. The stories of a young man's unraveling family and the circumstances surrounding the mystery of Annie's death work as a backdrop to this tale of love and loss.
| Details | | Publication Date: | 2003-10-01 | | Edition Description: | Reprint |
| Size | | Length: | 320 pages | | Height: | 8.3 in | | Width: | 5.8 in | | Thickness: | 1.0 in | | Weight: | 10.2 oz |
Publisher's Note Weaves together two stories in the account of how fifteen-year-old Arthur Parkinson's family fell apart and the life and sudden and violent death of Annie Marchand, his former baby-sitter and a young woman Arthur had adored as a child. Reprint.
Industry Reviews "The reader is drawn into a landscape that is bleak and miserable but utterly believable." New York Times Book Review - Mary Breasted
"...[A] brutal and lyrical coming-of-age story set in the seventies." Nation - A. O. Scott (04/22/1996)
"A thriller of the heart, at once suspenseful and emotionally absorbing." Paretsky
"Simple, intricate storytelling...an unusually skillful first novel." Paretsky
"Beautiful and harrowing....O'Nan's debut novel is an exquisite double helix, each of its two strands the tale of an unraveling family, curving in tenuous but essential relation to the other." Paretsky
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