Thursday, May 1, 2014

Coming Soon to a Book Store Near You - The Hollow Ground; Natalie Harnett

Here's my "Coming Soon to a Book Store Near You" pick for today. I thought this sounded like a good one. Do you like the sound of it? 

The Hollow Ground; Natalie Harnett
Thomas Dunne Books - May 13, 2014 
Description

"We walk on fire or air, so Daddy liked to say. Basement floors too hot to touch. Steaming green lawns in the dead of winter. Sinkholes, quick and sudden, plunging open at your feet." 
 
The underground mine fires ravaging Pennsylvania coal country have forced eleven-year-old Brigid Howley and her family to seek refuge with her estranged grandparents, the formidable Gram and the black lung‒stricken Gramp. Tragedy is no stranger to the Howleys, a proud Irish-American clan who takes strange pleasure in the “curse” laid upon them generations earlier by a priest who ran afoul of the Molly Maguires. The weight of this legacy rests heavily on a new generation, when Brigid, already struggling to keep her family together, makes a grisly discovery in a long-abandoned bootleg mine shaft. In the aftermath, decades-old secrets threaten to prove just as dangerous to the Howleys as the burning, hollow ground beneath their feet.

Inspired by real-life events in Centralia and Carbondale, where devastating coal mine fires irrevocably changed the lives of residents, The Hollow Ground is an extraordinary debut with an atmospheric, voice-driven narrative and an indelible sense of place. Lovers of literary fiction will find in Harnett’s young, determined protagonist a character as heartbreakingly captivating as Scout Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird.

6 comments:

  1. That sounds very interesting and we are pretty familiar with that real life area.

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  2. Diane, this does sound "atmospheric", very real and gritty. I hope you'll enjoy this book.

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  3. I will have to keep a look-out for this one, thanks Diane :)

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  4. This one sounds very intriguing to me!

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  5. Sounds like such an interesting book, and as a Scout fan, I think I would enjoy the story and the protagonist.

    Thanks for an enticing review.

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  6. The book sounds interesting and I like the cover!

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