Synopses & Reviews
Justin Kramon’s debut novel,
Finny, is a sweeping, enchanting voyage, an insightful story about a young woman’s complicated path to adulthood.
We meet Finny Short as an observant, defiant fourteen-year-old who can’t make sense of her family’s unusual habits: Her mother offers guidance appropriate for a forty-year-old socialite; her father quotes Nietzsche over pancakes. Finny figures she’s stuck with this lonely lot until she meets Earl Henckel, a boy who comes from an even stranger place than she does. Unhappy with Finny’s budding romance with Earl, her parents ship her off to Thorndon boarding school. But mischief follows Finny as she befriends New York heiress Judith Turngate, a girl whose charm belies a disquieting reckless streak.
Finny’s relationships with Earl and Judith open her up to dizzying possibilities of love and loss and propel her into a remarkable adventure spanning twenty years and two continents. Justin Kramon has given us a wickedly funny odyssey with a moving and original love story at its core. Finny introduces us to an unforgettable heroine, a charmingly intricate world, and an uncommonly entertaining and gifted young novelist.
Review
"Justin Kramon's moving and engrossing, Finny, is as refreshing as it is unusual: Dickensian in its span and generosity, contemporary in its exuberance and furtive humor, timeless in its assessment of family and friendship, innocence and love, this is a debut novel of exceptional achievement and considerable rewards."
Jim Crace, National Book Critics Circle Award-Winning author of Being Dead
Review
"Justin Kramon has written a magnificently odd and fantastic book, bursting with whimsy and humor. Finny is a heroine you will never forget."
Christina Henriquez, Author of The World in Half
Review
"A fresh, appealing, funny, and big-hearted first novel by a fresh, appealing, funny, big-hearted, and talented young novelist. With Finny, Justin Kramon has made a winning debut."
John Burnham Schwartz, National-Bestselling Author of The Commoner and Reservation Road
Review
"[A book] that is suffused with tenderness and the promise of good things for the author's future."
Booklist
About the Author
A graduate of the Iowa Writers’ Workshop, Justin Kramon has published stories in Glimmer Train, Story Quarterly, Boulevard, Fence, TriQuarterly, and others. He has received honors from the Michener-Copernicus Society of America, Best American Short Stories, the Hawthornden International Writers’ Fellowship, and the Bogliasco Foundation. He teaches at Gotham Writers’ Workshop in New York City and at the Iowa Young Writers’ Workshop. Now twenty-nine years old, he lives in Philadelphia.