How to Find Your Way in the Dark
The powerful and epic coming-of-age story from the author of Norwegian By Night
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- £4.99
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- £4.99
Publisher Description
'Compelling and deeply satisfying.' Booklist
'[A] terrific coming-of-age story . . . Readers will root for Sheldon, a memorable survivor, every step of the way.' Publishers Weekly
'Miller juggles each element effortlessly. His character portraits are indelible, often heartbreaking. At times this novel moved me to tears' The New York Times
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It's 1936, war is brewing, tempers are running high, and by his thirteenth birthday, Sheldon Horowitz has been orphaned - twice. While a terrible accident took his mother, Sheldon is convinced that his father was murdered. But no-one else thinks so, least of all the police.
Determined to track down the culprit, and leaving behind his only friend Lenny, Sheldon moves to Hartford, Connecticut to live with his uncle. He is told to keep his head down and forget the past. But that just isn't his style.
Fired up by his politically-minded cousin Abe (and quite possibly in love with other cousin Mirabelle), he sets out on a quest to discover the truth that will take him from industrial Hartford to a ritzy hotel in the Catskills, back to his childhood home and finally on to New York.
Sheldon quickly discovers that it's a jungle out there, and to survive, he will have to learn to make his own luck. Fortunately, that's one thing he's very good at...
A tragic-comic coming of age story like no other, for fans of All The Light We Cannot See, and Michael Chabon's The Adventures of Kavalier and Clay.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
This terrific coming-of-age story, a prequel to Miller's Norwegian by Night, follows Sheldon Horowitz from his parents' deaths before his 13th birthday in 1937 to his departure a decade later from the isolated New England village where he and Lenny Bernstein, his best friend and the only other Jewish kid he knows, lead lives largely sheltered from both anti-Semitism and Jewish culture. Sheldon, a tough kid with outdoor skills cultivated during a childhood spent hunting and trapping with his father, a shell-shocked WWI vet, decides, correctly, that the accident that killed his dad as they drove home from his mother's funeral was murder, and devotes his teen years to seeking vengeance while living with an uncle. This quest spirals into grimly entertaining capers, including a jewel heist in the burgeoning borscht belt resorts of the Catskills. Diverting subplots track America's entry into WWII and the birth of modern stand-up comedy, as shown by Lenny's hilarious forays into showbiz. Readers will root for Sheldon, a memorable survivor, every step of the way.
