The Road to Dalton
A NPR BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR
From debut author Shannon Bowring comes a novel of small town America that Pulitzer-winner Richard Russo calls, "measured, wise, and beautiful."
In most small towns, the private is also public. In the town of Dalton, one local makes an unthinkable decision that leaves the community reeling. In the aftermath, their problems, both small and large, reveal a deeper understanding of the lives of their neighbors, and remind us all that no one is exactly who we think they are.
It's 1990. In Dalton, Maine, life goes on. Rose goes to work at the diner every day, her bruises hidden from both the customers and her two young boys. At a table she waits, Dr. Richard Haskell looks back on the one choice that's charted his entire life, before his thoughts wander back to his wife, Trudy, and her best friend.
Trudy and Bev have been friends for longer than they can count, and something more than lovers to each other for some time now--a fact both accepted and ignored by their husbands. Across town, new mother Bridget lives with her high school sweetheart Nate, and is struggling with postpartum after a traumatic birth. And nearer still is teenager Greg, trying to define the complicated feelings he has about himself and his two close friends.
The Road to Dalton offers valuable understandings of what it means to be alive in the world--of pain and joy, conflict and love, and the endurance that comes from living.
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★ "Bowring offers endless, rich details about life in Dalton, making a satisfying story of each chapter, expanding the emotional history of the place, yielding great depths of pain behind small, daily gestures of human connection... An impressive debut bursting with detail and love for the town it brings to life."--Kirkus Reviews (starred review)
"An unexpected death touches everyone, a plot point that Bowring confidently steers away from melodrama, landing instead on poignant realism. Readers will want to take their time with this one."--Publishers Weekly
"Paved with beauty, grace, humility, and love...a triumphant work that reminds us what literature should be."--Morgan Talty, author of Night of the Living Rez
"The kind of book that too often flies under the literary radar these days: measured, wise, beautiful."--Richard Russo, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Empire Falls
"Over and over, The Road to Dalton locates the miraculous in the mundane, then holds it up, glimmering, for the reader to see. In the end it reminds us that, no matter our circumstances, each of us is imbued with a dignity that cannot be denied or taken from us."--Ron Currie, Jr., author of Everything Matters and The One-Eyed Man
"In wise, tender, sharp-eyed prose, Shannon Bowring illuminates the interlocking lives of rural Mainers in her stunning debut. I thoroughly enjoyed this book from beginning to end, for its vivid portrait of time and place and its cast of instantly unforgettable characters, all portrayed in glorious and often heartbreaking humanity. Bowring is an immensely talented writer to watch."--Aaron Hamburger, author of Hotel Cuba and Nirvana Is Here
"A gentle and poignant portrait of small-town life in Maine--and of the spoken and unspoken truths that make a community. The Road to Dalton celebrates the better angels of our nature; a story of hope and family from a fresh new voice."--Cara Hoffman, author of Running and Ruin
"What a rare gift Bowring has for sly humor and nuance as she paints these unforgettable characters in their rawest pain and sweetest joy. A genius, stealthy love story and a beautiful ode to family and friendship."--Susan Conley, author of Landslide
