Henry recalls the Labor Day weekend in 1987 when he was 13 and escaped convict Frank stayed for awhile at his house with him and his agoraphobic mother Adele.Though Frank is considered dangerous by the authorities and the general public, Henry sees him differently:
“The feeling I had, when I thought of Frank, contained no fear. More like anticipation and excitement. It was if I’d been in the middle of a book that I had put down when I got too tired to keep reading, or a video put on pause. I wanted to pick back up with the story and find out what happened to the characters, except that the characters were us.” (p 50 ARC, may vary from final published version)
Overall this is a moving story about the experiences and people that have a part in shaping your identity. Although Henry was certainly a capable narrator, he was rather detached from the emotional core of the story – the tender relationship that develops between the two broken adults. I would have loved to get inside Adele’s head and see at least some of the story from her point of view.
This gem of a novel is out in hardcover now. Find out more about it at the author’s website.
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