November 23, 2004
Hannah Tinti Recommends
"I just finished The Night Country by Stewart O’Nan," Tinti says. "It’s amazing—the best book I’ve read in a while. I heard O’Nan give a reading from it at the Brattleboro Literary Festival in October. Since The Night Country was one of the few books of O’Nan’s that I hadn’t picked up yet, I bought a copy to read when I got home. It turned out to be the perfect Halloween novel: A group of five teenagers are in a terrible car accident in a New England town. Three of them are killed. Two survive. Now here’s the cool part—the book is narrated from the point of view of the dead teenagers. It sounds impossible to pull off, but Stewart O’Nan handles it brilliantly. His writing is just plain beautiful, heartbreaking and threaded with sharp black humor. The story picks up year later—the first anniversary of the crash—Halloween, of course, and the ghosts are zipping in and out of people’s heads. Then it gets really exciting—one of the living teenagers, Tim, is planning on re-creating the crash, killing himself and the other survivor, a boy named Kyle who is now brain-damaged. Throw into the mix Officer Brooks, the policeman trying to stop it from happening again, and Kyle’s mom, whose life has been turned upside down by her son’s disability, and you have an emotionally gripping, white-knuckle countdown literary thriller."
Hannah Tinti grew up in Salem, Massachusetts. Her short story collection, Animal Crackers, was published by the Dial Press in March 2004. She is currently the editor of One Story magazine.
If you'd like to recommend an underappreciated book for this series, please send mail to llalami at yahoo dot com.
About
bio articles news contact rssMy Events
04.26: LA Times Festival of Books04.30: Claremont, California
09.23-10.04: International Literature Festival Berlin
Search
My book
In hardcover
In Morocco
In Italian
In Portuguese
In french
In dutch
In spanish
Monthly Archives
April 2008March 2008
February 2008
January 2008
December 2007
November 2007
October 2007
September 2007
August 2007
July 2007
June 2007
May 2007
April 2007
March 2007
February 2007
January 2007
December 2006
November 2006
October 2006
September 2006
August 2006
July 2006
June 2006
May 2006
April 2006
March 2006
February 2006
January 2006
December 2005
November 2005
October 2005
September 2005
August 2005
July 2005
June 2005
May 2005
April 2005
March 2005
February 2005
January 2005
December 2004
November 2004
October 2004
September 2004
August 2004
July 2004
June 2004
May 2004
April 2004
March 2004
February 2004
January 2004
December 2003
November 2003
October 2003
September 2003
August 2003
July 2003
June 2003
May 2003
April 2003
March 2003
February 2003
January 2003
December 2002
November 2002
October 2002
September 2002
August 2002
July 2002
June 2002
May 2002
April 2002
March 2002
February 2002
January 2002
December 2001
November 2001
October 2001