Synopses & Reviews
In the spellbinding and suspenseful Let Me Die in His Footsteps, Edgar Awardwinner Lori Roy wrests from a Southern town the secrets of two families touched by an evil that has passed between generations. On a dark Kentucky night in 1952 exactly halfway between her fifteenth and sixteenth birthdays, Annie Holleran crosses into forbidden territory. Everyone knows Hollerans dont go near Baines, not since Joseph Carl was buried two decades before, but, armed with a silver-handled flashlight, Annie runs through her familys lavender fields toward the well on the Baines place. At the stroke of midnight, she gazes into the water in search of her future. Not finding what she had hoped for, she turns from the well and when the body she sees there in the moonlight is discovered come morning, Annie will have much to explain and a past to account for.
It was 1936, and there were seven Baine boys. That year, Annies aunt, Juna Crowley, with her black eyes and her long blond hair, came of age. Before Juna, Joseph Carl had been the best of all the Baine brothers. But then he looked into Junas eyes and they made him do things that cost innocent people their lives. Sheriff Irlene Fulkerson saw justice servedor did she?
As the lavender harvest approaches and she comes of age as Aunt Juna did in her own time, Annies dread mounts. Juna will come home now, to finish what she started. If Annie is to save herself, her family, and this small Kentucky town, she must prepare for Junas return, and the revelation of what really happened all those years ago
Review
"Lori Roy masterfully mixes a noir approach with gothic undertones for an engrossing story about family secrets and tragedies. . . . Bent Road is one of the best debuts of 2011."
Review
"Even the simplest scenes crackle with suspense."
Review
“Rich and evocative, Lori Roy's voice is a welcome addition to American fiction." -Dennis Lehane
“Lori Roy has entered the arena of great American authors shared by Williams, Faulkner and Lee.” -BookReporter (on Until She Comes Home)
“Roy is calculated in the way she builds and eases tension . . . even the simplest scenes crackle with suspense.” -People (on Bent Road)
“Outstanding. . . . Roys language pulses with so much subtle tension . . . exposing the characters true selves and their tragic secrets.” -Milwaukee Journal Sentinel (on Until She Comes Home)
“Expect the unexpected, and youll get it.” -Seattle Post-Intelligencer (on Bent Road)
Synopsis
A remarkably assured debut novel. Rich and evocative, Lori Roy's voice is a welcome addition to American fiction. -Dennis Lehane
For twenty years, Celia Scott has watched her husband, Arthur, hide from the secrets surrounding his sister Eve's death. As a young man, Arthur fled his small Kansas hometown, moved to Detroit, married Celia, and never looked back. But when the 1967 riots frighten him even more than his past, he convinces Celia to pack up their family and return to the road he grew up on, Bent Road, and that same small town where Eve mysteriously died.
While Arthur and their oldest daughter slip easily into rural life, Celia and the two younger children struggle to fit in. Daniel, the only son, is counting on Kansas to make a man of him since Detroit damn sure didn't. Eve-ee, the youngest and small for her age, hopes that in Kansas she will finally grow. Celia grapples with loneliness and the brutality of life and death on a farm.
And then a local girl disappears, catapulting the family headlong into a dead man's curve...
On Bent Road, a battered red truck cruises ominously along the prairie; a lonely little girl dresses in her dead aunt's clothes; a boy hefts his father's rifle in search of a target; a mother realizes she no longer knows how to protect her children. It is a place where people learn: Sometimes killing is the kindest way.
Synopsis
Winner of the Edgar Award for Best First Novel
"Don't be fooled by the novel's apparent simplicity: What emerges from the surface is a tale of extraordinary emotional power, one of longstanding pain set against the pulsating drumbeat of social change."
-Sarah Weinman, NPR.org
For twenty years, Celia Scott has watched her husband, Arthur, hide from the secrets surrounding his sister Eve's death. But when the 1967 Detroit riots frighten him even more than his Kansas past, he convinces Celia to pack up their family and return to the road he grew up on, Bent Road, and the same small town where Eve mysteriously died. And then a local girl disappears, catapulting the family headlong into a dead man's curve. . . .
On Bent Road, a battered red truck cruises ominously along the prairie; a lonely little girl dresses in her dead aunt's clothes; a boy hefts his father's rifle in search of a target; and a mother realizes she no longer knows how to protect her children. It is a place where people learn: Sometimes killing is the kindest way.
Bent Road has been optioned for film in 2012 by Cross Creek Pictures with Mark Mallouk to adapt and Benderspink to produce.
About the Author
LORI ROY is the autho of Bent Road, winner of the Edgar Award for Best First Novel, and Until She Comes Home, finalist for the Edgar Award for Best Novel. She lives in St. Petersburg, Florida, with her family.