Mystery writer William Kent Krueger has taken a
break from his award-winning Cork O'Connor mystery series to give readers the
gift of ORDINARY
GRACE, an atmospheric novel about forty year-old Frank Drum looking back on
a fateful summer that changed him and his family - as well as his perceptions of
the world and people in it.
The book details Frank's
journey in the summer of 1961, when he was 13 years old and living in New Bremen, Minnesota with his traditional,
"All-American" family - his father, a Christian minister; his mother
a once-budding musician; his younger brother, a stutterer, who is wise and
compassionate; and his beautiful,
musically gifted and much-adored older sister, headed for Julliard. In 1961, the country, and this community, was
infused with faith and wholesome innocence, but death paid several visits to New
Bremen during a sweltering summer via the accidental death of a teenager (was
it really an accident?), the natural death of a stranger, a suicide and a
murder that shatters lives and futures.
William Kent Krueger
renders a thoughtful portrait of small
town life and the inhabitants therein. Via strong, multi-layered characterizations,
the author maps the deep-rooted values that once marked the souls of flawed, God-fearing
people. Frank narrates this story from
the perspective of adulthood, which lends authority to the magnitude of grief and
the search for understanding when evil impacts the lives and hearts of an
entire community. In the end, the themes that emerge in this moving
coming-of-age story become timeless as the Drum family could be any faith-filled
family--past or present--forced to confront and come to terms with the vagaries
of life, guilt and dark nights of the soul.
Atria Books, $24.99, Hardcover, 9781451645828, 320
pp
Publication Date: March 26, 2013
Please note: This book was provided for
review by Atria Books/Simon & Schuster
