The Bright Forever : A Novel

A dark, harrowing novel about a nine-year-old girl's disappearance and the lasting impact it has on her close-knit community On an evening like any other, nine-year-old Katie Mackey, daughter of the most affluent family in a small town on the plains of Indiana, sets out on her bicycle to return some library books. This simple act is at the heart of The Bright Forever , a deeply affecting novel about the choices people make that change their lives forever . Fact, speculation, and contradiction play off one another as the details about Katie's disappearance—and about the townspeople—unfold, creating a fast-paced story that is as gripping as it is richly human. A nuanced portrayal of the complicated give and take among people struggling to maintain their humanity in the shadow of a loss, The Bright Forever is a compelling and emotional tale about the human need to know even the hardest truth. A painful, agonizing tale of guilt and loss, a tragedy told with all the tortured wisdom of hindsight and plenty of psychological damage to go around. On a sleepy summer evening in a tiny Indiana town in the 1970s, nine-year-old Katie Mackey rushes out of her house and hops on her bike to return an overdue library book - never to return. Narrated with thirty years of retrospective by Henry Dees, the reclusive, lonely math tutor who had been giving Katie summer lessons, Martin's narrative plunges into the minds of each of its characters in order to reveal the darkness behind the pastoral facade. Katie's father, Junior, owns the glassworks that employs a sizeable portion of the town's residents. Her family is akin to royalty in this simple world, envied by many for what seems to be a picture-perfect life. But pictures are only snapshots of reality, and only capture moments, not the entirety of existence. In this case, the reality is that Katie's family will never see her alive again - and the guilt crashes in on all of them, as well as many others. Because Martin's point isn't so much the mystery as it is the anguish: the mental instant replay that constantly has people saying "if only." On an evening like any other, nine-year-old Katie Mackey, daughter of the most affluent family in a small town on the plains of Indiana, sets out on her bicycle to return some library books.This simple act is at the heart of The Bright Forever, a suspenseful, deeply affecting novel about the choices people make that change their lives forever. Keeping fact, speculation, and contradiction playing off one another as the details unfold, author Lee Martin creates a fast-paced story that is as gripping as it is richly human. His beautiful, clear-eyed prose builds to an extremely nuanced portrayal of the complicated give and take among people struggling to maintain their humanity in the shadow of a loss.Reminiscent of books such as The Little Friend and The Lovely Bones, but most memorable for its own perceptions and power, The Bright Forever is a compelling and emotional tale about the human need to know even the hardest truth.From the Hardcover edition.