Synopses & Reviews
Synopsis
An NPR Best Book of 2017, now in paperback When Oliver Bonds loses his toddler son and undergoes intense legal scrutiny over his involvement, grief engulfs him completely. His life is upended, costing Oliver his wife, home, and faith. Three years after his son's death, Oliver lives in a shack and frequents the soup kitchen where he used to volunteer.
It's only when befriended by Lyle, a bombastic, oversexed con artist with a passion for conspiracy theories, that Oliver begins to re-engage with the world. Inspired by Lyle and a community of eccentrics, Oliver becomes convinced that the Earth is hollow and holds a true Eden. Desperate to find a place where he can escape his past, Oliver chases after the most unlikely of miracles.
With unforgettable characters, wild imagery, and dark humor, Hollow explores the depths of doubt and hope, stretching past grief and into the space where we truly begin to heal.
"With the kind of grace not usually seen in accessible modern fiction, Egerton also invokes many other things with this central metaphor . . . Ollie's voice is one of the most believable I've encountered this year, sustained by honesty, realism, and compassion. In his exile, Ollie has taken stock. His reckoning with the past creates the story's exquisite tension and makes the final scene bloom with tenderness . . . The core of Hollow is anything but." --NPR
Synopsis
Winner of the 2017 PEN Southwest Book Award for Fiction An NPR Best Book of 2017, now in paperback When Oliver Bonds loses his toddler son and undergoes intense legal scrutiny over his involvement, grief engulfs him completely. His life is upended, costing Oliver his wife, home, and faith. Three years after his son's death, Oliver lives in a shack and frequents the soup kitchen where he used to volunteer.
It's only when befriended by Lyle, a bombastic, oversexed con artist with a passion for conspiracy theories, that Oliver begins to re-engage with the world. Inspired by Lyle and a community of eccentrics, Oliver becomes convinced that the Earth is hollow and holds a true Eden. Desperate to find a place where he can escape his past, Oliver chases after the most unlikely of miracles.
With unforgettable characters, wild imagery, and dark humor, Hollow explores the depths of doubt and hope, stretching past grief and into the space where we truly begin to heal.
"With the kind of grace not usually seen in accessible modern fiction, Egerton also invokes many other things with this central metaphor . . . Ollie's voice is one of the most believable I've encountered this year, sustained by honesty, realism, and compassion. In his exile, Ollie has taken stock. His reckoning with the past creates the story's exquisite tension and makes the final scene bloom with tenderness . . . The core of Hollow is anything but." --NPR
Synopsis
Winner of the 2017 PEN Southwest Book Award for Fiction An NPR Best Book of 2017
"With the kind of grace not usually seen in accessible modern fiction, Egerton also invokes many other things with this central metaphor . . . The core of Hollow is anything but." --NPR
"An incredibly imaginative examination of grief, faith, and the relationship between the two." --B&N Reads, 1 of 12 Must-Read Indie Books
"I was blown away by Owen Egerton's achingly beautiful, compulsively readable tale . . . Hollow is filled to the brim with wonder and the sadness of being human." --Sarah Hepola, New York Times bestselling author of Blackout
When Oliver Bonds loses his toddler son, his life is upended. It's only when he becomes convinced that the Earth is hollow that Oliver chases after this most unlikely of miracles, searching for a way to escape his past.
Synopsis
An NPR Best Book of the Year, Hollow is the story of a professor whose life is unended after an unspeakable tragedy.
When Oliver Bonds, a revered religious studies professor at the University of Texas, loses his toddler son and undergoes intense legal scrutiny over his involvement, grief engulfs him completely. His life as he knows it is over; Oliver loses his wife, home, and faith. Three years after his son's death, Oliver lives in a shack without electricity and frequents the soup kitchen where he used to volunteer.
It's only when befriended by Lyle, a con artist with a passion for theories of Hollow Earth, that Oliver begins to reengage with the world. Oliver too becomes convinced that the inside of the planet might contain a different realm. Desperate to find a place where he can escape his past, Oliver chases after the most unlikely of miracles.
With unforgettable characters, wild imagery, and dark humor, Hollow explores the depths of doubt and hope, stretching past grief and into the space where we truly begin to heal.
With the kind of grace not usually seen in accessible modern fiction, Egerton also invokes many other things with this central metaphor . . . Ollie's voice is one of the most believable I've encountered this year, sustained by honesty, realism, and compassion. In his exile, Ollie has taken stock. His reckoning with the past creates the story's exquisite tension and makes the final scene bloom with tenderness . . . The core of Hollow is anything but. --NPR