Status
Available
Call number
Genres
Publication
Back Bay Books (2013), Edition: Reprint, 480 pages
Description
"Lauren Sheehan's career in medicine came to a halt after a sequence of violent events abroad. Now she's back in the safest place she knows--St. Helens, Wisconsin--cut off from career, friendship, and romance. Ben Hanson's aimless life bottomed out when he went to prison. But after his release, a surprising offer from his father draws him home. In Wisconsin, he finds his family fractured, still unable to face the truth behind his troubled cousin's death a decade earlier. As Lauren cautiously expands her world and Ben tries to unravel the mysteries of his family and himself, their paths intersect. Could each be exactly what the other needs? A compelling family drama and a surprising love story, THIS BRIGHT RIVER confirms Patrick Somerville's status as one of the most exciting young writers at work today"--… (more)
User reviews
LibraryThing member froxgirl
Not as fanciful as The Cradle - in fact not fanciful at all - pretty dark with miseries coming from both sides of a relationship that may or may not work out. But great characters. Could have used about 100 less pages and one less plot line. The men are vivid but the women are ciphers. Worth the
Show More
read if you are patient. Show Less
LibraryThing member johnluiz
I eagerly anticipated this novel because I thoroughly enjoyed The Cradle. This novel is very different, though, and a much more ambitious work. The Cradle told its story in a straightforward fashion as a husband is sent out on a mission by his pregnant wife to find an ancient cradle her mother had
Show More
when she was a child - and in that quest he discovers something much more vitally important to her. The story in This Bright River unfolds in a far less linear pattern. Two characters, Ben and Lauren, who knew each other in high school, return to their Wisconsin hometown in their 30s after each of them has suffered significant setbacks. But we don't get their backstory in a straightforward manner. We're given small details along the way, as the present story of their re-discovery of each other keeps circling back with revelations of partial details of their past - he ended up in prison after he exacted revenge against a friend and former business partner by burning the man's apartment down because the friend had stolen his girlfriend. She, after serving as a doctor in Africa, ran away from her husband, and is now deeply wounded and depressed from the turmoil of that relationship. Another key element of the story is the death of Ben's cousin, Wayne, who froze in the woods of his father's remote cabin in Michigan's Upper Peninsula. The novel progresses in even more than a circling pattern because, as the details build-up, the back stories also go down meandering paths, the relevance of which aren't apparent until the novel starts to bring all the pieces together near the end of the book. But even then the pieces aren't perfectly reunited because that's part of the books theme - that you can't ever discover the full meaning or hidden "truth" of events from the past. There's a moment of high suspense about three-quarters of the way in when Ben and Lauren's haunted pasts converge, but then even deeper family secrets are revealed as the novel returns to its moving contemplation of what dredging up the past means and whether it's ever possible to have any of it make enough sense to help you move forward. In the early pages, the novel requires a bit of patience as you get partial mysterious details about the characters, but it richly pays off if you stick with it. Show Less
LibraryThing member lucy3107
Not sure what to say about this one. Didn't love it, didn't hate it. It read well enough - I finished it in two days, but I felt like the book was having an identity crisis - it didn't know whether it wanted to be a character study, a mystery, a psychological thriller, or a literary fiction book.
Show More
It just seemed disjointed. Show Less
LibraryThing member sraelling
Mystery set in St. Helen's, WI, a small town near Madison. Main characters include Ben - ex-con -, his successful parents & sister, her father's brother, Denny, & his son Wayne, Lauren - became a dr & traveled the world, married Will, left Will - who is a nut case. Lots of twists & turns - last 1/4
Show More
of book was the most exciting/interesting. Show Less
Awards
Dublin Literary Award (Longlist — 2014)
Language
Original language
English
Physical description
8.1 inches
ISBN
0316129305 / 9780316129305