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Descent: A Novel
Author:
Johnston, Tim
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Class:
Fiction
Age: Adult
Language: English
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LC: PS3610.O
Print Run: 35000
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ISBN-13: 9781616203047
LCCN: 2014024023
Imprint: Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill
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Pub Date: 01/06/2015
Availability: Out of Print Confirmed
List: $25.95
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Hardcover
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Physical Description:
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374 pages ; 24 cm
H 9",
W 6"
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LC Series:
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Brodart Sources:
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Brodart's Insight Catalog: Adult
Brodart's TOP Adult Titles
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Bibliographies:
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New York Times Bestsellers List
New York Times Bestsellers: Adult Fiction
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Awards:
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Publishers Weekly Starred Reviews
School Library Journal Best Adult Books for High School Students
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Starred Reviews:
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Publishers Weekly
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TIPS Subjects:
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Suspense/Thriller
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BISAC Subjects: |
FICTION / Thrillers / Crime
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LC Subjects:
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Abduction, Fiction
Domestic fiction
Families, Fiction
Loss (Psychology), Fiction
Missing persons, Fiction
Mystery fiction
Psychological fiction
Rocky Mountains Region, Fiction
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SEARS Subjects: |
Domestic fiction
Family life, Fiction
Kidnapping, Fiction
Loss (Psychology), Fiction
Missing persons, Fiction
Mystery fiction
Psychological fiction
Rocky Mountains, Fiction
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Reading Programs: |
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| Annotations |
| Brodart's TOP Adult Titles | 10/01/2014 |
| When a daughter vanishes during a summer morning's run, her family slowly crumbles as each member heads down increasingly different paths, desperate for answers they may never find. 384pp., 35K, Auth res: Memphis, TN, Tour |
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| Starred Reviews: |
| Publishers Weekly | 10/13/2014 |
| In Johnston's sorrowful and suspenseful first adult novel, a family is forced to face its worst nightmare when one of its members goes missing. Caitlin Courtland, an 18-year-old runner about to enter college on a track scholarship, is vacationing with her family in the Rockies when she fails to come back from an early morning run. Over the course of the next two years, the family fractures as no sign of Caitlin is ever found. Grant Courtland, Caitlin's father, remains in the Rockies, while mother Angela tries to pick up the pieces back home in Wisconsin, where she eventually makes a failed attempt at suicide. Meanwhile, Caitlin's younger brother, Sean, drives aimlessly around the country, getting in and out of trouble. Although it begins as one more variation on Alice Sebold's The Lovely Bones, a late-in-the-novel coincidence sends the narrative in a new direction and turns it into a survival story involving a character who, heretofore, has played a relatively minor part in the drama. Johnston (Irish Girl) has a poet's eye for the majestic and forbidding nature of the Rockies, and a sociologist's understanding of how people act under pressure. He also has a knack for creating characters that the reader will come to care about, no matter how flawed they are. Combining domestic drama with wilderness adventure, Johnston has created a hybrid novel that is as emotionally satisfying as it is viscerally exciting. (Jan.). 384p. PUBLISHERS WEEKLY, c2014. |
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| Journal Reviews |
| BookPage | 01/01/2015 |
| Tim Johnston's latest novel has an unusual take on the parent's-worst-nightmare scenario of child abduction. He doesn't focus so much on the abductee, Caitlin Courtland, but instead on what Caitlin's disappearance does to the men in her life. Caitlin is snatched while the family is on vacation in the Rockies; they're there partially because it's a great place for Caitlin, a champion high school runner, to train. The disaster shatters the family almost at once, but things were shaky for the Courtlands even before the kidnapping. Dad Grant was unfaithful to his wife, Angela. Dudley adored his older sister, even though she teased him for being fat and unambitious. Still, both he and Grant are guilt-ridden for not being able to protect her. Johnston's women are tangential, but not because he's one of those male writers who can't write credible women. With the exception of Angela, who falls to pieces and stays that way for pretty much the whole book, the women are fairly strong, intelligent and well-rounded. Caitlin, during the brief time we see her, is a powerhouse. But it's the men who demand answers; Caitlin's abduction is an affront to their manhood, even if they never knew her. They speak in bursts of terse but beautifully rendered dialogue and their thoughts are just as circumspect. Johnston's equally spare, alluring descriptions of the landscape, the weather, geriatric cars and trucks, farm equipment and firearms recall Annie Proulx. Both suspenseful and sorrowful, Descent explores what it means to be a man--a husband, a father, a brother, a son, an officer of the law--in an uncertain time. McKanic, Arlene. 384 pages. BOOKPAGE, c2015. |
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| Kirkus Reviews | 11/15/2014 |
| Johnston tracks the dissolution of a family following the disappearance of the teenage daughter during a Colorado vacation.Grant and Angela Courtland's marriage might not be rock solid, but it's working when they take their two children, 18-year-old college-bound track star Caitlin and shy 15-year-old Sean, on vacation in the Colorado Rockies. Biking with Caitlin during an early morning mountain run, Sean crashes and breaks his leg. With no cell service and no help for miles, Caitlin hesitantly accepts a ride from a stranger who offers to drive her into town. That's the last time she's seen, and with his injuries, Sean isn't much help in identifying her abductor. Time passes too quickly yet with excruciating slowness as the family tries, and fails, to pick up the pieces as the weeks become months with no sign of Caitlin. Angela returns to the family's Wisconsin home, while Grant and Sean remain in Colorado, apparently in an effort to find Caitlin (though little actual searching seems to take place). Caitlin's fate, or at least an inkling of it, is revealed early, deflating much of the ensuing story's suspense. Sean strikes out on his own, going on an aimless cross-country odyssey before ending up back in Colorado, where Grant is helping an elderly man look after his land, perpetually hoping for news of Caitlin. Neither Grant nor Sean--Angela barely registers for the reader--makes for a compelling lead character, both laconic to the point of annoyance, and while Caitlin's ordeal is chilling, it's not enough to buoy this overwritten yet occasionally poignant tale. 384pg. KIRKUS MEDIA LLC, c2014. |
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9781616203047,dl.it[0].title
| Review Citations |
| New York Times Book Review | 01/18/2015 |
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