The Book of Ruth

PEN/Hemingway Award Winner: An enthralling novel of a woman trapped within a tragically dysfunctional family (Entertainment Weekly). From the New York Timesbestselling author of The Excellent Lombards and A Map of the World this is an extraordinary story of a familys disintegration [that] will be compared to Jane Smileys A Thousand Acres (People). It follows Ruth Grey a young woman in a tiny Illinois farm town who has lost her father to World War II and constantly faces her unhappy mothers wrathwhen she isnt being ignored in favor of her math-prodigy brother. As Ruth navigates her lonely life she strives to find happiness and pleasure where she can but the world may conspire to defeat her. A sly and wistful if harrowing human comedy... [An] original voice in fiction and one well worth listening to. TheBoston Sunday Globe Unforgettably beat by beat Hamilton maps the best and worst of the human heart and all the mysterious uncharted country in between. Kirkus Reviews Hamiltons story builds to a shocking crescendo. Her small-town characters are as appealingly offbeat and brushed with grace as any found in Alice Hoffmans or Anne Tylers novels. Glamour