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THE EXACT NATURE OF OUR WRONGS
By: Janet Peery
St. Martin's Press
September 2017
On Sale: September 19, 2017
288 pages
ISBN: 1250125081
EAN: 9781250125088
Kindle: B06XC4MKSH
Hardcover / e-Book
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Fiction
Janet Peeryโs first novel, The River Beyond the World, was a National Book Award finalist in 1996. Acclaimed for her gorgeous writing and clear-eyed gaze into the hearts of people, Peery now returns with her second novel, The Exact Nature of Our Wrongs. On a summer evening in the blue-collar town of Amicus, Kansas, the Campbell family gathers for a birthday dinner for their ailing patriarch, retired judge Abel Campbell, prepared and hosted by their still-hale mother Hattie. But when Billy, the youngest siblingโwith a history of addiction, grand ideas, and misdemeanorsโpasses out in his devilโs food cake, the family takes up the unfinished business of Billyโs sobriety. Billyโs wayward adventures have too long consumed their lives, in particular Hattieโs, who has enabled his transgressions while trying to save him from Abelโs disappointment. As the older childrenโDoro, Jesse, ClairBell, and Gideonโcontend with their own troubles, they compete for the approval of the elderly parents they adore, but canโt quite forgive. With knowing humor and sure-handed storytelling, Janet Peery reveals a family at its best and worst, with old wounds and new, its fractures and feuds, and yet its unbreakable bonds.
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